reached through the bars, and still wordless
little Mario Incandenza sways down the steep path to the portcullis in the warm rain and interfaces with Clipperton through the bars
Context
The one figure who reaches the desperate, unreal Clipperton is Mario again — "interfacing through the bars" of the front gate in the rain, the same unguarded contact he made with Loach's outstretched hand. Clipperton can only stare wordlessly up at the spikes, past speech, and the gesture that gets him inside is not counsel but Mario's plain willingness to go down and stand at the bars with him. That the contact still can't save him (he blows his brains out an hour later) is the scene's grief: even the one channel that opens is not always enough.