His tongue

was tired for he had been talking all the afternoon in a

public-house in Dorset Street. Most people considered Lenehan a

leech but, in spite of this reputation, his adroitness and eloquence

had always prevented his friends from forming any general policy

against him. He had a brave manner of coming up to a party of

them in a bar and of holding himself nimbly at the borders of the

company until he was included in a round. He was a sporting

vagrant armed with a vast stock of stories, limericks and riddles.

He was insensitive to all kinds of discourtesy. No one knew how

he achieved the stern task of living, but his name was vaguely

associated with racing tissues.


"And where did you pick her up, Corley?" he asked.


Corley ran his tongue swiftly along his upper lip.


"One night, man," he said, "I was going along Dame Street and I

spotted a fine tart under Waterhouse's clock and said good- night,

you know. So we went for a walk round by the canal and she told

me she was a slavey in a house in Baggot Street. I put my arm

round her and squeezed her a bit that night. Then next Sunday,

man, I met her by appointment. We vent out to Donnybrook and I

brought her into a field there. She told me she used to go with a

dairyman.... It was fine, man. Cigarettes every night she'd bring me

and paying the tram out and back. And one night she brought me

two bloody fine cigars--O, the real cheese, you know, that the old

fellow used to smoke.... I was afraid, man, she'd get in the family

way. But she's up to the dodge."


"Maybe she thinks you'll marry her," said Lenehan.


"I told her I was out of a job," said Corley. "I told her I was in

Pim's. She doesn't know my name. I was too hairy to tell her that.

But she thinks I'm a bit of class, you know."


Lenehan laughed again, noiselessly.


"Of all the good ones ever I heard," he said, "that emphatically

takes the biscuit."


Corley's stride acknowledged the compliment. The swing of his

burly body made his friend execute a few light skips from the path

to the roadway and back again. Corley was the son of an inspector

of police and he had inherited his father's frame and gut. He

walked with his hands by his sides, holding himself erect and

swaying his head from side to side. His head was large, globular

and oily; it sweated in all weathers; and his large round hat, set

upon it sideways, looked like a bulb which had grown out of

another. He always stared straight before him as if he were on

parade and, when he wished to gaze after someone in the street, it

was necessary for him to move his body from the hips. At present

he was about town. Whenever any job was vacant a friend was

always ready to give him the hard word. He was often to be seen

walking with policemen in plain clothes, talking earnestly. He

knew the inner side of all affairs and was fond of delivering final

judgments. He spoke without listening to the speech of his

companions. His conversation was mainly about himself what he

had said to such a person and what such a person had said to him

and what he had said to settle the matter. When he reported these

dialogues he aspirated the first letter of his name after the manner

of Florentines.


Lenehan offered his friend a cigarette.