Uncle Charles smoked such black twist that at last his nephew suggested to him to enjoy his m smoke in a little outhouse at the end of the garden.
-- Very good, Simon. All serene, Simon, said the old man tranquilly. Anywhere you like. The outhouse will do me nicely: it will be more salubrious.
-- Damn me, said Mr Dedalus frankly, if I know how you smoke such villainous awful tobacco. Its like gunpowder, by God.
-- Its very nice, Simon, replied the old man. Very cool and mollifying.
Every m, therefore, uncle Charles repaired to his outhouse but not before he had greased and brushed scrupulously his back hair and brushed and put on his tall hat. While he smoked the brim of his tall hat and the bowl of his pipe were just visible beyond the jambs of the outhouse door. His arbour, as he called the reeking outhouse which he shared with the cat and the garden tools, served him also as a sounding-box: and every m he hummed tentedly one of his favourite songs: O, twine me a bower or Blue Eyes and Golden Hair or The Groves of Blarney while the grey and blue coils of smoke rose slowly from his pipe and vanished in the pure air.
During the first part of the summer in Blackrocle Charles was Stephens stant panion. Uncle Charles was a hale old man with a well tanned skin, rugged features and white side whiskers. On week days he did messages between the house in Carysfort Avenue and those shops in the main street of the town with which the family dealt. Stephen was glad to go with him on these errands for uncle Charles helped him very liberally to handfuls of whatever was exposed in open boxes and barrels outside the ter. He would seize a handful of grapes and sawdust or three or four Ameri apples and thrust them generously into his grandnephews hand while the shopman smiled uneasily; and, on Stephens feigniao take them, he would frown and say:
-- Take them, sir. Do you hear me, sir? Theyre good for your bowels.
When the order list had been booked the two would go on to the park where an old friend of Stephens father, Mike Flynn, would be foued on a bench, waiting for them. Then would begin Stephens run round the park. Mike Flynn would stand at the gate he railway station, wat hand, while Stephen ran round the tra the style Mike Flynn favoured, his head high lifted, his knees well lifted and his hands held straight down by his sides. When the m practice was over the trainer would make his ents and sometimes illustrate them by shuffling along for a yard or so ically in an old pair of blue vas shoes. A small ring of woruck children and nursemaids would gather to watch him and linger even when he and uncle Charles had sat down again aalking athletid politics. Though he had heard his father say that Mike Flynn had put some of the best runners of modern times through his hands Stephen often gla his trainers flabby stubble-covered face, as it bent over the long stained fihrough which he rolled his cigarette, and with pity at the mild lustreless blue eyes which would look up suddenly from the task and gaze vaguely into the blue distance while the long swollen fingers ceased their rolling and grains and fibres of tobacco fell bato the pouch.
On the way home uncle Charles would often pay a visit to the chapel and, as the font was above Stephens reach, the old man would dip his hand and then sprihe water briskly about Stephens clothes and on the floor of the porch. While he prayed he k on his red handkerchief