"It'll do excellently."
"We shall probably get a balcony table if all those downstairs are booked."
As Rokeby said, they were in time for a balcony table, and he ordered dinner and wine before recurring to his former question.
"What was all the mystery about No. 30?"
"I don't call it a mystery; it was just a very ordinary domestic proposition; I didn't want them to be interrupted this evening, because, you see—you will laugh—"
"No, I swear I won't; do tell me."
"Marie wants to ask for a perambulator."
"'Him'?"
"Yes, him. Who's always 'him' to the household—the husband, the tyrant, the terror. Ugh!"
"Oh, come, Miss Winter. Osborn Kerr—I've known him for years; there's nothing of the tyrant and the terror about him. Why this embroidery of the sad tale?"