After finishing the bottle in conjunction, they parted in good fellowship. We were near forgetting that O'Hara mentioned something about paying one hundred francs for which he was indebted, but the democrat thrust back the purse which was produced, and said, 'Whenever it suits you;' and as it didn't happen just then to suit the aristocrat, he returned the purse unopened to his pocket. There was not a syllable more of argument, if we except a friendly quotation which Friezecoat sent as a parting shot from his balcony to his retiring friend: 'Hallo! Mr. O'Hara—
| 'When Adam dolve, and Eve span, |
| Who was then the gentleman?' |
followed by a loud laugh.
'The O'Hoolohan Roe!' said O'Hara to himself, as he lingered at the gate of the Pension; 'that's what he called himself. Who the deuce can the O'Hoolohan Roe be? I have heard of the M'Carthy More, of the O'Conor Don, and of the O'Donoghue of the Glens; but never of him before.'
In the interests of our readers, we, too, must endeavour to find out who the O'Hoolohan Roe really was.
CHAPTER VIII.
POPPING THE QUESTION.
ON the following day, true to his word, the O'Hoolohan Roe might be seen pulling the bell at the door of No. 39, in the Rue de la Vieille Estrapade. He was elaborately got up in a suit of brand-new garments of blue cloth, which did not fit his short, stout form too nicely. He had bought them at a cheap slop warehouse, and doubtless paid more than he would have been asked at one of the modest, humdrum establishments where clothes are made to wear as well as sell. His hat was new and glistened in the sunshine, for the day was one of those pet days which surprise us in early spring; in his gloved hands (yes, absolutely gloved) he flourished a silver-headed Malacca cane; on his broad breast were ranged in rainbow row, under a nosegay, perhaps a little too large, the vari-coloured ribbons of innumerable decorations. He marched up the staircase with a firm, a pretentiously firm step, until he reached the corridor, off which lay the apartment of Captain Chauvin; and then he stopped and listened. The tinkle-tinkle of a piano, lightly touched on the treble, reached his ears through the keyhole. He halted and blushed—searched in the back-pockets of his new coat for his handkerchief—drew it out and vehemently rubbed his face. His face looked hot; the application of the handkerchief seemed to make it hotter. When he put back his handkerchief, a waft of perfume rested on the air. Scarcely had he restored it to his pocket, when his hand sought the pocket again. What! can he be going to display it anew? How fidgety the man looks! No; that is not the loud-patterned square of cambric, three horses' heads printed on its corner, which he brings forth this time, but—it can hardly be believed—an oval pocket-mirror. He inspects his hot, red face in its disk, goes through the motion of raising his shirt-collar, brushes back his hair, replaces his hat on his head, and the mirror in his pocket, and coughs.
'Amour, amour, quand tu nous tiens.'
What it is to be in love!
Hist!—he speaks. Is he formulating the compliments he is about to make? No; he soliloquizes, and in what a curt, unnatural voice—a shamefaced voice! Listen: