“We’ll drink champagne to her, Fabos, me bhoy,” he whispered as the soup was served. “Sure, matrimony is very like that same wine—a good thing at the beginning, but not so good when you take overmuch of it. ’Twould be married I had been meself to the Lady Clara Lovenlow of Kildare, but for the blood of Saxons in her veins. Ay, and a poor divil of a man I would be this same time, if I had done it. Sure, think of Timothy McShanus with his feet in the family slippers and his daughters singing ‘The Lost Chord’ to him. Him that is the light of the Goldsmith Club. Who goeth home even with the milk! Contemplate it, me bhoy, and say what a narrow escape from that designing wench he has had.” He rattled on, and I did not interrupt him. To be plain, I was glad of his company. Had it appeared to Joan Fordibras that I was quite alone in the hotel, that I knew no friends in Dieppe, and had no possible object in visiting the town but to renew acquaintance with her during her father’s absence—had this been so, then the difficulties of our intercourse were manifest. Now, however, I might shelter my intentions behind this burly Irishman. Indeed, I was delighted at the encounter. “McShanus,” I said, “don’t be a fool. Or if you must be one, don’t include me in the family relationship. Do I look like a man whose daughters will be permitted to sing the ‘Lost Chord’ to him?” “Ye can never judge by looks, Docthor. Me friend Luke O’Brien, him that wrote ‘The Philosophy of Loneliness’ in the newspapers, he’s seven children in County Cork and runs a gramophone store. ‘Luke,’ says I, ‘’tis a fine solitude ye have entirely.’ ‘Be d——d to that,’ says he—and we haven’t spoken since.” “Scarcely delicate to mention it, McShanus. Let me relieve your feelings by telling you that my yacht, _White Wings_, will be here to-morrow night to fetch me.” “Glory be to God, ye’ll be safe on the sea. I mistrust the colleen entirely. Look at the eyes of it. D’ye see the little foot peepin’ in and out—‘like mice beneath the petticoat,’ says the poet. She’s anxious to show ye she’s a small foot and won’t cost ye much in shoe leather. Turn your head away when she laughs, Ean, me bhoy. ’Tis a wicked bit of a laugh, and to a man’s destruction.” “I must remember this, McShanus. Do you think you could entertain the old lady while I talk to her?” “What, the she-cat with the man’s hair and the telescope? The Lord be good to me. I’d sooner do penal servitude.” “Now, come, you can see by her glance that she is an authority upon some of the ’isms, McShanus. I know that she plays golf. I saw her carrying sticks this very afternoon.” “To break heads at a fair. Is Timothy McShanus fallen to this? To tread at the heels of a she-man with sticks in her hands. Faith, ’twould be a fancy fair and fête entirely.” “Drink some more champagne, and brace yourself up to it, Timothy.”