Forbes thought the word "roughly" appropriate. In his soul there was a sound like the last sough of water in an emptying bathtub. He added mentally the ten dollars he had given Fernand, and the ten dollars he must give the waiter. He wondered if he looked as sick as he felt; as sick as his hundred dollars would look. He had cherished a mad fancy for inviting everybody to dinner, the theater, and a tango supper. If his modest luncheon put him where it did, he wondered where such an evening would have left him. From this point of view he was escaping cheaply. Anyway, he had crossed the Rubicon. He was too poor to be able to afford to skimp. If he had been an Enslee Estate, he could have offered his guests toast and distilled water without being suspected of poverty.
And once committed to the course he had chosen, he would have beggared his family rather than stint his hospitality. He was a gentleman; a fool, perhaps, but a gentleman.
He gave Fernand the order to go ahead. Fernand was upset by the brevity of the time allotted him, but promised to do his best. Forbes cast his eye about for a good table. Fernand put up his hand:
"Miss Cabot has her favorite table. You shall have that, also her captain and her waiter."
"But this luncheon is really in honor of Mrs. Neff," he said.
"Ah, in that case you will want her table. She prefers the opposite side, nearer the band."
Forbes, having a little while to kill, set out for a stroll round the block. It came to him suddenly that the precious hundred dollars he had drawn to make a good show would evaporate and leave almost nothing. He went to his bank and wrote a check for fifty dollars more. As he stood waiting at the paying-teller's grill he felt as if he were a forger taking money he had no right to. But the teller expressed no surprise. When Forbes returned to the Ritz-Carlton he found his guests already gathering in the lounge. Willie Enslee came in late and surly. He explained that his man had had the impudence to fall ill, and had left him to dress himself.
They had their cocktails, and then Forbes led his little flock up to the rich pasture. He had to beg pardon through a knot of people pleading vainly for tables in the circle. They were being turned off into the side rooms of mediocrity.