—­Limbo!  Temple cried.  That’s a fine invention too.  Like hell.

—­But with the unpleasantness left out, Dixon said.

He turned smiling to the others and said: 

—­I think I am voicing the opinions of all present in saying so much.

—­You are, Glynn said in a firm tone.  On that point Ireland is united.

He struck the ferrule of his umbrella on the stone floor of the colonnade.

—­Hell, Temple said.  I can respect that invention of the grey spouse of Satan.  Hell is Roman, like the walls of the Romans, strong and ugly.  But what is limbo?

—­Put him back into the perambulator, Cranly, O’Keeffe called out.

Cranly made a swift step towards Temple, halted, stamping his foot, crying as if to a fowl: 

—­Hoosh!

Temple moved away nimbly.

—­Do you know what limbo is? he cried.  Do you know what we call a notion like that in Roscommon?

—­Hoosh!  Blast you!  Cranly cried, clapping his hands.

—­Neither my arse nor my elbow!  Temple cried out scornfully.  And that’s what I call limbo.

—­Give us that stick here, Cranly said.

He snatched the ashplant roughly from Stephen’s hand and sprang down the steps:  but Temple, hearing him move in pursuit, fled through the dusk like a wild creature, nimble and fleet-footed.  Cranly’s heavy boots were heard loudly charging across the quadrangle and then returning heavily, foiled and spurning the gravel at each step.

His step was angry and with an angry abrupt gesture he thrust the stick back into Stephen’s hand.  Stephen felt that his anger had another cause but, feigning patience, touched his arm slightly and said quietly: 

—­Cranly, I told you I wanted to speak to you.  Come away.

Cranly looked at him for a few moments and asked: 

—­Now?

—­Yes, now, Stephen said.  We can’t speak here.  Come away.

They crossed the quadrangle together without speaking.  The bird call from Siegfried whistled softly followed them from the steps of the porch.  Cranly turned, and Dixon, who had whistled, called out: 

—­Where are you fellows off to?  What about that game, Cranly?

They parleyed in shouts across the still air about a game of billiards to be played in the Adelphi hotel.  Stephen walked on alone and out into the quiet of Kildare Street opposite Maple’s hotel he stood to wait, patient again.  The name of the hotel, a colourless polished wood, and its colourless front stung him like a glance of polite disdain.  He stared angrily back at the softly lit drawing-room of the hotel in which he imagined the sleek lives of the patricians of Ireland housed in calm.  They thought of army commissions and land agents:  peasants greeted them along the roads in the country; they knew the names of certain French dishes and gave orders to jarvies in high-pitched provincial voices which pierced through their skin-tight accents.