St Stephen's Green is a public park in Dublin whose narrative significance comes from its changing atmosphere: it first lends a party of young men the air of a capital city, then frames the contrast between Corley’s pursuit and Lenehan’s increasingly solitary, uneasy vigil. In “Two Gallants,” its roads and edges become part of a circuit of walking, watching, and waiting rather than a place of arrival.

Setting and Movement

In “After the Race,” the five young men stroll along Stephen's Green at night after dinner and political conversation. A faint cloud of aromatic smoke hangs around them; their cloaks dangle from their shoulders, and people make way as they pass. The city seems, for a moment, to wear the mask of a capital. The park is not just scenery for their walk: it helps stage the party’s temporary sense of prominence and ease in public space.

The Green in “Two Gallants”

Later, Corley and Lenehan cross the road at Stephen's Green after walking together in silence, with the harpist’s mournful music following them. The tram noise, lights, and crowd release them from that silence. The crossing marks a brief change in mood, but not a resolution: the pair soon separate, and Lenehan follows Corley and the young woman at a distance.

Lenehan Alone and Waiting

After seeing Corley and the young woman climb the Donnybrook tram, Lenehan turns back alone. At the railings of the Duke's Lawn, he lets his hand run along them; the harp tune begins to shape his movements, with his feet playing the melody and his fingers tracing variations on the railings. The scene gives the park’s edge an intimate role: public music continues within Lenehan’s solitary, bodily response after the company has gone.

As Lenehan wanders around the Green and down Grafton Street, his mood darkens. The crowd’s invitations to boldness do not engage him, and he feels he must talk, invent, and amuse when he meets Corley again, though his brain and throat feel too dry for the effort. The dark, quiet street he chooses afterward suits his morose state; the park belongs to a sequence of movement through which the expected liveliness of the evening drains away.

The Vigil

At a quarter to ten, Lenehan returns to the Green’s northern side, hurrying because Corley might return too soon. Near Merrion Street he stands in the shadow of a lamp, lights one of his reserved cigarettes, and watches the place where he expects Corley and the young woman to appear. While he waits, he imagines the stages of Corley’s success and then fears his friend may have gone home another way and left him behind. He smokes his last cigarette nervously and strains to see each tram stopping at the far corner. The setting thus becomes a threshold of expectation, but the scene supplies no confirmation of what has happened: Lenehan is left watching, guessing, and waiting.