twenty minutes past eight
Maybe they 've gone to get ready for dinner . '' From a small bag she wore at her belt , American tourist-fashion , she pulled out an old-fashioned gold watch of the kind that winds up with a key -- her mother 's , perhaps , on which she had borrowed money to reach New York . `` Something must be wrong with my watch , '' she said . `` It ca n't be twenty minutes past eight . '' The same thing was wrong with Stephen 's expensive repeater , whose splendour he was ashamed to flaunt beside the modesty of the girl 's poor little timepiece . There remained now no reasonable doubt that it was indeed twenty minutes past eight , since by the mouths of two witnesses a truth can be established . `` How dreadful ! ''