An excited and sympathetic nurse provided Hyacinth with copies of the four morning papers, which he read with interest and a good deal of amusement. Only the account in the Daily Independent caused him any uneasiness. No doubt, as he fully recognised, the suggestion about the Trinity student was nothing but a wild guess on the part of the reporter. It was highly unlikely that anyone would seriously consider a theory so intrinsically improbable. Still, if the faintest suspicion of the part he had played reached the ears of the college authorities, he felt that his career as a divinity student was likely to be an extremely brief one. His chief fear was that a prolonged absence from college would give rise to inquiry, and that his bandages would excite suspicion when he reappeared. Fortunately, the house surgeon decided that he was sufficiently recovered to be allowed to leave the hospital early in the afternoon. The boot which had put an end to his share in the riot had raised its bruise under his hair, so he was able to remove the bandages from his head as soon as he got into the street. There still remained a long strip of plaster meant to keep a dressing of iodoform in its place over the cut on his cheek which Mr. Shea’s chair-leg had inflicted. This he could not get off, and thinking it wiser to make his entry into college after nightfall, he sought a refuge in Mary O’Dwyer’s rooms.
He found the poetess laid on a sofa and clad in a blue dressing-gown. She stretched a hand of welcome to Hyacinth, and then, before he had time to take it, began to laugh immoderately. The laughing fit ended in sobs, and then tears flowed from her eyes, which she mopped convulsively with an already damp pocket-handkerchief. Before she had recovered sufficient self-possession to speak, she signed to Hyacinth to fetch a bottle of smelling-salts from the chimney-piece. He hastened to obey, and found himself kneeling beside the sofa, holding the bottle to her nose. After a while she recovered sufficiently to tell him that she had not slept at all during the night, and felt extremely unwell and quite unstrung in consequence. Another fit of immoderate and tearful laughter followed, and Hyacinth, embarrassed and alarmed, fetched a tumbler of soda-water from the syphon on the sideboard. The lady refused to swallow any, and, just as he had made up his mind to risk an external application, recovered again. During the lucid interval which followed she informed him that his own conduct had been superb and heroic. What seemed to be an effort to celebrate his achievements in extemporary verse brought on another fit. Hyacinth determined to risk an appearance in the college square in broad daylight rather than continue his ministrations. While he was searching for his hat Miss O’Dwyer became suddenly quite calm, and began to explain to him how immensely the cause of Ireland’s independence had benefited by the demonstration in the Rotunda. Hyacinth listened anxiously, waiting for the next explosion, and experienced very great relief when the door opened and Augusta Goold walked in.
Unlike Mary O’Dwyer, she was entirely mistress of herself. Her cheeks were not a shade paler than usual, nor her hand at all less cool and firm. She stretched herself, after her usual fashion, in the largest available chair and lit a cigarette.
‘You look excited, my dear Mary,’ she said—‘a little overexcited, perhaps. Have you had tea? No? Perhaps you will be so kind as to ring the bell, Mr. Conneally.’
Mary O’Dwyer repeated the information she had given Hyacinth about her sleepless night, and complimented Augusta Goold on her nerve.
‘As for poor little me,’ she went on, ‘I’m like a—like a—you remember the kind of thing, don’t you?—like a—I’m not sure if I know the name of the thing myself.’
She relapsed into a weak giggle, and Hyacinth stooped for the bottle of smelling-salts, which had rolled under the sofa. Augusta Goold was much less sympathetic. She fixed her with a strong stare of amazement and disgust. Apparently this treatment was the right one, for the giggling stopped almost immediately.
‘I see you have got some sticking-plaster on your face, Mr. Conneally,’ she said, when Mary O’Dwyer had quieted down.
‘Yes,’ said Hyacinth, ‘and a good-sized bump behind my ear.’
‘I suppose this business will be very awkward for you in college. Will they turn you out?’