GOD I THOUGHT THE ARCHBISHOP WAS INSIDE. He mightn't like it, though. What? God, I'll tell him anyhow. That was the great earl, the Fitzgerald Mor. Hot members they were all of them, the Geraldines.
The horses he passed started nervously under their slack harness. He slapped a piebald haunch quivering near him and cried:
--Woa, sonny!
He turned to J. J. O'Molloy and asked:
--Well, Jack. What is it? What's the trouble? Wait awhile. Hold hard.
With gaping mouth and head far back he stood still and, after an instant, sneezed loudly.
--Chow! he said. Blast you!
--The dust from those sacks, J. J. O'Molloy said politely.
--No, Ned Lambert gasped, I caught a ... cold night before ... blast your soul ... night before last ... and there was a hell of a lot of draught ...
He held his handkerchief ready for the coming ...
--I was ... Glasnevin this morning ... poor little ... what do you call him ... Chow! ... Mother of Moses!
* * * * *
Tom Rochford took the top disk from the pile he clasped against his claret waistcoat.
--See? he said. Say it's turn six. In here, see. Turn Now On.
He slid it into the left slot for them. It shot down the groove, wobbled a while, ceased, ogling them: six.
Lawyers of the past, haughty, pleading, beheld pass from the consolidated taxing office to Nisi Prius court Richie Goulding carrying the costbag of Goulding, Collis and Ward and heard rustling from the admiralty division of king's bench to the court of appeal an elderly female with false teeth smiling incredulously and a black silk skirt of great amplitude.
--See? he said. See now the last one I put in is over here: Turns Over. The impact. Leverage, see?
He showed them the rising column of disks on the right.
--Smart idea, Nosey Flynn said, snuffling. So a fellow coming in late can see what turn is on and what turns are over.
--See? Tom Rochford said.
He slid in a disk for himself: and watched it shoot, wobble, ogle, stop: four. Turn Now On.
--I'll see him now in the Ormond, Lenehan said, and sound him. One good turn deserves another.
--Do, Tom Rochford said. Tell him I'm Boylan with impatience.
--Goodnight, M'Coy said abruptly. When you two begin
Nosey Flynn stooped towards the lever, snuffling at it.
--But how does it work here, Tommy? he asked.
--Tooraloo, Lenehan said. See you later.
He followed M'Coy out across the tiny square of Crampton court.
--He's a hero, he said simply.
--I know, M'Coy said. The drain, you mean.
--Drain? Lenehan said. It was down a manhole.
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