the street at one end and into a kitchen at the other. The proprietor and
cook was a Frenchman, known to us as Monsieur Vingtieme; the
waiters were his two daughters, Rose and Berthe; and the food, according
to faith, was good. The tables were so narrow and were set so close
together that there was space for twelve of them, six jutting from each
wall.

Only the two nearest to the door, as I went in, were occupied. On
one side sat a tall, flashy, rather Mephistophelian man whom I had seen
from time to time in the domino-room and elsewhere. On the other side
sat Soames. They made a queer contrast in that sunlit room, Soames
sitting haggard in that hat and cape, which nowhere at any season had I
seen him doff, and this other, this keenly vital man, at sight of whom I
more than ever wondered whether he were a diamond merchant, a
conjurer, or the head of a private detective agency. I was sure Soames
didn't want my company; but I asked, as it would have seemed brutal not
to, whether I might join him, and took the chair opposite to his. He was
smoking a cigarette, with an untasted salmi of something on his plate and
a half-empty bottle of Sauterne before him, and he was quite silent. I
said that the preparations for the Jubilee made London impossible. (I
rather liked them, really.) I professed a wish to go right away till the
whole thing was over. In vain did I attune myself to his gloom. He
seemed not to hear me or even to see me. I felt that his behavior made
me ridiculous in the eyes of the other man. The gangway between the
two rows of tables at the Vingtieme was hardly more than two
feet wide (Rose and Berthe, in their ministrations, had always to edge
past each other, quarreling in whispers as they did so), and any one at the
table abreast of yours was virtually at yours. I thought our neighbor was
amused at my failure to interest Soames, and so, as I could not explain
to him that my insistence was merely charitable, I became silent.