"That's the reason we came here," answered George, with a calm manner of assumption that dissipated the waiter's doubts while it evidently filled him with remorse. "Where's Auguste?"
"He's gone to bed, sir; but I guess 'twill be all right." And the waiter started to fetch the beer.
"I should think so," growled Perry.
"I suppose it is not good form to drink beer with oysters," I suggested mildly.
"I don't know, I'm sure," said George.
"I suppose not," said Perry; "they go so well together. I hope it isn't, at any rate: I like to do things that are bad form."
So I relapsed into silence, and my speculations about George's outbreak against gambling, and Mrs. Herbert's beautiful face and sad eyes, and Lucretia Knowles's wicked light-heartedness.
When we had finished eating and had opened the last bottle of beer, I asked George, as he stopped his talk with Perry for a moment to relight his cigar, who Mrs. Herbert was.
"She is the noblest and most unfortunate woman in the world," he replied, "I will tell you her story some time, perhaps."
"Let us hear it now," I cried, looking at Perry with triumph.