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DON JOHN CONMEE: Now, Father Dolan! Now. I’m
sure that Stephen is a very good little boy!
ZOE: (Examining Stephen’s palm) Woman’s hand.
STEPHEN: (Murmurs) Continue. Lie. Hold me. Caress.
I never could read His handwriting except His criminal
thumbprint on the haddock.
ZOE: What day were you born?
STEPHEN: Thursday. Today.
ZOE: Thursday’s child has far to go. (She traces lines on
his hand) Line of fate. Influential friends.
FLORRY: (Pointing) Imagination.
ZOE: Mount of the moon. You’ll meet with a ... (She
peers at his hands abruptly) I won’t tell you what’s not good
for you. Or do you want to know?
BLOOM: (Detaches her fingers and offers his palm) More
harm than good. Here. Read mine.
BELLA: Show. (She turns up bloom’s hand) I thought so.
Knobby knuckles for the women.
ZOE: (Peering at bloom’s palm) Gridiron. Travels beyond
the sea and marry money.
BLOOM: Wrong.
ZOE: (Quickly) O, I see. Short little finger. Henpecked
husband. That wrong?
(Black Liz, a huge rooster hatching in a chalked circle, ris-
es, stretches her wings and clucks.)
BLACK LIZ: Gara. Klook. Klook. Klook.
(She sidles from her newlaid egg and waddles off)
BLOOM: (Points to his hand) That weal there is an acci-
dent. Fell and cut it twentytwo years ago. I was sixteen.