Page:A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (Huebsch 1916).djvu/235

 On a table near the door were two photographs in frames and between them a long roll of paper bearing an irregular tail of signatures. MacCann went briskly to and fro among the students, talking rapidly, answering rebuffs and leading one after another to the table. In the inner hall the dean of studies stood talking to a young professor, stroking his chin gravely and nodding his head.

Stephen, checked by the crowd at the door, halted irresolutely. From under the wide falling leaf of a soft hat Cranly's dark eyes were watching him.

—Have you signed?—Stephen asked.

Cranly closed his long thinlipped mouth, communed with himself an instant and answered:

—Ego habeo.—

—What is it for?—

—Quod?—

—What is it for?—

Cranly turned his pale face to Stephen and said blandly and bitterly:

—Per pax universalis.—

Stephen pointed to the Tsar's photograph and said:

—He has the face of a besotted Christ.—

The scorn and anger in his voice brought Cranly's eyes back from a calm survey of the walls of the hall.

—Are you annoyed?—he asked.

—No—answered Stephen.

—Are you in bad humour?—

—No.—

—Credo ut vos sanguinarius mendax estis—said Cranly—quia facies vostra monstrat ut vos in damno malo humore estis.—

Moynihan, on his way to the table, said in Stephen's ear: