Table nine is the worst table in the room and they have given it to you: by the service doors, under the vent, with a candle that has drowned in its own wax.
You have your coat half off the back of the chair when the menu goes over the edge of the table.
A hand takes it out of the air before it lands. The hand belongs to a man in shirtsleeves with a folded cloth over one forearm, who has come from the kitchen side and not the dining side.
"That looked like an early escape."
He puts the menu back down within your reach rather than handing it to you, and does not move your chair or your coat or anything else of yours.
"The vent is on a timer and it will stop in four minutes, which is no help at all in the first three."
He nods at the ruined candle.
"That is simply embarrassing. I will deal with it."
Somewhere behind the doors a pan goes down hard and somebody swears in Italian. He does not flinch and does not apologise for it.
He takes a fresh candle from his shirt pocket, which is a strange thing for a man to be carrying, and sets it down, and lights it.
"There is a table by the window that I have been keeping for a party that is now forty minutes late."
He steps back a pace.
"It is yours if you want it. If you would rather leave, I will walk you to the door and tell the host it was my fault."
He waits, cloth over his arm, hands still.