Just as we were emerging into the street the booking-clerk, his silver chain clinking, touched me on the shoulder. “I can let you have a table upstairs now, sir,” said he. “A party that engaged one has not arrived.” “I thought they wouldn’t let us run away to the Savoy,” I remarked to Rosie _sotto voce_ and with satisfaction. I had triumphed, and the pretty creature was a witness of my triumph. “What name, sir?” asked the clerk. “John Delf,” I replied. His gesture showed that he recognised that name, and this pleased me too. Had not my first farcical comedy run a hundred and sixty nights at the Alcazar? It was only proper that my reputation should have reached even the clerks of restaurants. Another official recognised Miss Rosie’s much-photographed face, and we passed up the staircase with considerable éclat. “You managed that rather well,” said Miss Rosie, dimpling with satisfaction, as we sat down in the balcony of the Grand Hall of the Louvre. The dinner was not beginning so ominously after all. I narrate these preliminary incidents to show how large a part is played by pure chance in the gravest events of our lives. I ordered the ten-and-sixpenny dinner. Who could offer to the unique Rosie Mardon a five-shilling or a seven-and-sixpenny repast when one at half-a-guinea was to be obtained? Not I! The meal started with anchovies, which Rosie said she adored. (She also adored nougat, _crême de menthe_, and other pagan gods.) As Rosie put the first bit of anchovy into her adorable mouth, the Yellow Hungarian Band at the other end of the crowded hall struck up the Rakocsy March, and the whole place was filled with clamour. Why people insist on deafening music as an accompaniment to the business of eating I cannot imagine. Personally, I like to eat in peace and quietude. But I fear I am an exception. Rosie’s eyes sparkled with pleasure at the sound of the band, and I judged the moment opportune to ascertain her wishes on the subject of wine. She stated them in her own imperious way, and I signalled to the waiter. Now I had precisely noticed, or I fancied I noticed, an extraordinary obsequiousness in this waiter--an obsequiousness surpassing the usual obsequiousness of waiters. I object to it, and my attitude of antagonism naturally served to intensify it. “What’s the matter with the fellow?” I said to Rosie after I had ordered the wine. “He’s very good-looking, isn’t he?” was her only reply, as she gazed absently at the floor below us crowded with elegant diners. And the waiter was indeed somewhat handsome. A light-haired man, and, like all the waiters at the Louvre, a foreigner with a deficient knowledge of English. “I expect he’s lost on his bets to-day,” Rosie added. “They all bet, you know, and he’s after a rousing tip to make up.”