She passed the glass to him, and Bobby, avoiding Graham’s eyes, wondering why she was so gracious, emptied it.  And afterward frequently she reminded him of his wine by going through the same elaborate formula.  Probably because of that, as much as anything else, constraint grasped the little company tighter.  Graham couldn’t hide his anxiety.  Paredes mocked it with sneering phrases which he turned most carefully.  Before the meal was half finished Graham glanced at his watch.

“We’ve just time for the eight-thirty,” he whispered to Bobby, “if we pick up a taxi.”

Maria had heard.  She pouted.

“There is no engagement,” she lisped, “as sacred as a dinner, no entanglement except marriage that cannot be easily broken.  Perhaps I have displeased you, Mr. Graham.  Perhaps you fancy I excite unpleasant comment.  It is unjust.  I assure you my reputation is above reproach”—­her dark eyes twinkled—­“certainly in New York.”

“It isn’t that,” Graham answered.  “We must go.  It’s not to be evaded.”

She turned tempestuously.

“Am I to be humiliated so?  Carlos!  Why did you bring me?  Is all the world to see my companions leave in the midst of a dinner as if I were plague-touched?  Is Bobby not capable of choosing his own company?”

“You are thoroughly justified, Maria,” Paredes said in his expressionless tones.  “Bobby, however, has said very little about this engagement.  I did not know, Mr. Graham, that you were the arbiter of Bobby’s actions.  In a way I must resent your implication that he is no longer capable of caring for himself.”

Graham accepted the challenge.  He leaned across the table, speaking directly to Bobby, ignoring the others: 

“You’ve not forgotten what I told you.  Will you come while there’s time?  You must see.  I can’t remain here any longer.”

Bobby, hating warfare in his present mood, sought to temporize: 

“It’s all right, Hartley.  Don’t worry.  I’ll catch a later train.”

Maria relaxed.

“Ah!  Bobby still chooses for himself.”

“I’ll have enough rumpus,” Bobby muttered, “when I get to the Cedars.  Don’t grudge me a little peace here.”

Graham arose.  His voice was discouraged.

“I’m sorry.  I’ll hope, Bobby.”

Without a word to the others he walked out of the room.

So far, when Bobby tried afterward to recall the details of the evening, everything was perfectly distinct in his memory.  The remainder of the meal, made uncomfortable by Maria’s sullenness and Paredes’s sneers, his attempt to recapture the earlier gayety of the evening by continuing to drink the wine, his determination to go later to the Cedars in spite of Graham’s doubt—­of all these things no particular lacked.  He remembered paying the check, as he usually did when he dined with Paredes.  He recalled studying the time-table and finding that he had just missed another train.