O'Hara declined.
'I like it now and again. It lifts me into an ideal world—makes me forget the real. Drink?'
O'Hara accepted.
The stranger produced a dust-covered bottle with a yellow seal from the same drawer as before, and placed it before his companion. 'Comes from Pfungst Brothers,' was the only recommendation he ventured; but that was enough. The bottle was fitted with a false neck, to which a siphon, closing hermetically, was attached, so that the champagne could be sipped glass by glass, if desired, without loss of first freshness and that titillating effervescence which makes its charm.
O'Hara drank.
'Drink again. 'Twill sweep the cobwebs from your throat.'
'Do you ever feel lonely?' demanded Friezecoat, after a pause.
'Yes, sometimes very much. Like most Irishmen, I am changeful in my moods; to-day I find myself in the height of good spirits, to-morrow in the lowest depths of depression.'
'That is because you are not in your native land—have no home here—no interior. It is not well to be alone.'
The pair continued smoking. They smoked as connoisseurs, enjoying each particular puff, following it with dreamy eyes as it ascended, until it lost itself in gradually widening rings of lessening haze, and they embraced the stems of their pipes for a new pull with gloating lips.