‘I don’t care who,’ said Nutter, with dry ferocity, ’so he can load a pistol.’

‘Tom Forsythe would have done capitally, if he was at home,’ said one.

‘But he’s not,’ remarked Cluffe.

‘Well,’ said Toole, getting close up to Devereux, in a coaxing undertone, ‘suppose we try Loftus.’

‘Dan Loftus!’ ejaculated Devereux.

‘Dan Loftus,’ repeated the little doctor, testily; ’remember, it’s just eleven o’clock.  He’s no great things, to be sure; but what better can we get.’

‘Allons, donc!’ said Devereux, donning his cocked-hat, with a shrug, and the least little bit of a satirical smile, and out bustled the doctor beside him.

‘Where the deuce did that broganeer, O’Flaherty, come from?’ said Cluffe, confidentially, to old Major O’Neill.

‘A Connaughtman,’ answered the major, with a grim smile, for he was himself of that province and was, perhaps, a little bit proud of his countryman.

‘Toole says he’s well connected,’ pursued Cluffe; ’but, by Jupiter!  I never saw so-mere a Teague; and the most cross-grained devil of a cat-a-mountain.’

‘I could not quite understand why he fastened on Mr. Nutter,’ observed the major, with a mild smile.

‘I’ll rid the town of him,’ rapped out Nutter, with an oath, leering at his own shoebuckle, and tapping the sole with asperity on the floor.

’If you are thinking of any unpleasant measures, gentlemen, I’d rather, if you please, know nothing of them,’ said the sly, quiet major; ’for the general, you are aware, has expressed a strong opinion about such affairs; and as ’tis past my bed-hour, I’ll wish you, gentlemen, a good-night,’ and off went the major.

’Upon my life, if this Connaught rapparee is permitted to carry on his business of indiscriminate cut-throat here, he’ll make the service very pleasant,’ resumed Cluffe, who, though a brisk young fellow of eight-and-forty, had no special fancy for being shot.  ’I say the general ought to take the matter into his own hands.’

‘Not till I’m done with it,’ growled Nutter.

‘And send the young gentleman home to Connaught,’ pursued Cluffe.

‘I’ll send him first to the other place,’ said Nutter, in allusion to the Lord Protector’s well-known alternative.

In the open street, under the sly old moon, red little Dr. Toole, in his great wig, and Gipsy Devereux, in quest of a squire for the good knight who stood panting for battle in the front parlour of the ‘Phoenix,’ saw a red glimmer in Loftus’s dormant window.

‘He’s alive and stirring still,’ said Devereux, approaching the hall door with a military nonchalance.

‘Whisht!’ said Toole, plucking him back by the sash:  ’we must not make a noise—­the house is asleep.  I’ll manage it—­leave it to me.’

And he took up a handful of gravel, but not having got the range, he shied it all against old Tom Drought’s bed-room window.