He was gone in a second. And the unfortunate secretary was left with the lot of distributing copies and drawing up fresh notices. It was just on lock-up, so there was no time to do anything till the next day. He settled himself down to read the play. In a very short while he was thoroughly engrossed; by the time he had reached the end of the first act he had no doubt that Saturday would witness the most successful meeting of the Stoics since the historic occasion when Macdonald and Rogers had been persuaded to speak on opposite sides on "Trade Unionism," and Rogers had been most gloriously routed.
Betteridge went in search of Tester and Gordon.
"Come up to my study and read a play Ferrers has got hold of for the Stoics. It's glorious stuff."
"All right," said Gordon. "I will go and fetch Rudd."
"For God's sake, don't bring that outsider."
"Oh, hell, why not? He is quite respectable; and, after all, he is one of the best of our regular readers."
"All right then: fetch him along."
Since their scandalous ramble Gordon had become more or less friends with Rudd, and had to a large extent helped to make his life more bearable.
The four sat silent, reading the play. There was occasionally a suppressed laugh: otherwise no one spoke at all.
In under an hour they had all finished.