an hour wrangling with Doherty about the shortest way from Sallygap to
Larras.

--Pothead! Cranly said with calm contempt. What does he know about the
way from Sallygap to Larras? Or what does he know about anything for
that matter? And the big slobbering washing-pot head of him!

He broke into a loud long laugh.

--Well? Stephen said. Do you remember the rest?

--What you said, is it? Cranly asked. Yes, I remember it. To discover the
mode of life or of art whereby your spirit could express itself in
unfettered freedom.

Stephen raised his hat in acknowledgement.

--Freedom! Cranly repeated. But you are not free enough yet to commit
a sacrilege. Tell me would you rob?

--I would beg first, Stephen said.

--And if you got nothing, would you rob?

--You wish me to say, Stephen answered, that the rights of property
are provisional, and that in certain circumstances it is not unlawful
to rob. Everyone would act in that belief. So I will not make you that
answer. Apply to the jesuit theologian, Juan Mariana de Talavera, who
will also explain to you in what circumstances you may lawfully Kill
your king and whether you had better hand him his poison in a goblet or
smear it for him upon his robe or his saddlebow. Ask me rather would I
suffer others to rob me, or if they did, would I call down upon them
what I believe is called the chastisement of the secular arm?

--And would you?

--I think, Stephen said, it would pain me as much to do so as to be
robbed.

--I see, Cranly said.

He produced his match and began to clean the crevice between two teeth.
Then he said carelessly:

--Tell me, for example, would you deflower a virgin?

--Excuse me, Stephen said politely, is that not the ambition of most
young gentlemen?

--What then is your point of view? Cranly asked.

His last phrase, sour smelling as the smoke of charcoal and
disheartening, excited Stephen's brain, over which its fumes seemed to
brood.

--Look here, Cranly, he said. You have asked me what I would do and
what I would not do. I will tell you what I will do and what I will not
do. I will not serve that in which I no longer believe, whether it call
itself my home, my fatherland, or my church: and I will try to express
myself in some mode of life or art as freely as I can and as wholly as
I can, using for my defence the only arms I allow myself to use--silence,
exile, and cunning.

Cranly seized his arm and steered him round so as to lead him