STEEL. Yes.
SIR JOHN. What? After!
SIR, JOHN stands rigid, then turns and marches straight out into the hall. At a sign from KATHERINE, HUBERT follows him.
KATHERINE. Yes, Mr. Steel?
STEEL. [Still breathless and agitated] We were here—he slipped away from me somehow. He must have gone straight down to the House. I ran over, but when I got in under the Gallery he was speaking already. They expected something—I never heard it so still there. He gripped them from the first word—deadly—every syllable. It got some of those fellows. But all the time, under the silence you could feel a—sort of—of—current going round. And then Sherratt—I think it was—began it, and you saw the anger rising in them; but he kept them down—his quietness! The feeling! I've never seen anything like it there.
Then there was a whisper all over the House that fighting had begun. And the whole thing broke out—regular riot—as if they could have killed him. Some one tried to drag him down by the coat-tails, but he shook him off, and went on. Then he stopped dead and walked out, and the noise dropped like a stone. The whole thing didn't last five minutes. It was fine, Mrs. More; like—like lava; he was the only cool person there. I wouldn't have missed it for anything—it was grand!
MORE has appeared on the terrace, behind STEEL.
KATHERINE. Good-night, Mr. Steel.
STEEL. [Startled] Oh!—Good-night!
He goes out into the hall. KATHERINE picks up OLIVE'S shoes, and stands clasping them to her breast. MORE comes in.