By this time Tanner was on the scene, and for possibly ten minutes the dialogue and the action did not concern the photograph. Then Miss Lindner made a hurried exit, and Tanner began a soliloquy. This was one of the longest speeches in the piece, and the best, and Tanner delivered it with all the power and passion he could command. At the finish, Klein, as the butler, was supposed to enter and announce a visitor, who happened to be Metcalfe. Just before Klein’s entrance Tanner strode across the floor and picked up the frame. To this he was supposed to deliver the final line, which at the same time supplied the butler’s cue. “And as for Lord Wellingmay,” he dramatically recited, “let him beware. I am not the man to——” He stopped so abruptly as to cause a titter to run through the audience, who, up to this point had listened, spellbound. Tanner had picked up the frame at this critical moment and noticed the photograph. Klein, waiting in the doorway for his cue, felt his pulse quicken. The sight of the photograph—Delmar’s photograph—had caused Tanner to hesitate! The wait grew longer. Fearful of the delay, and aware that his entrance might set the dialogue moving once more, Klein stepped through the door. “A visitor, Mr. Lemly!” he announced stiffly. Klein’s line apparently brought Tanner back to earth again, and with a peculiar frown he turned and took up his cue. While they were waiting for Metcalfe to enter, Klein spoke aside to Tanner in the way that is quite common on the stage, and which is often done, although the audience has no idea how much private conversation goes on among the actors during a play. “What made you go up in the air?” he asked—and all the time a voice whispered in his ear: “Tanner’s the man! Tanner’s the man! His actions have proved it!” Tanner, meanwhile, was fumbling nervously at his collar. “I guess it—it was my nerves,” he answered. “I’ve been pounding too hard on the next week’s part. It’s frightfully warm here, isn’t it?” The entrance of Metcalfe interrupted the conversation. The juvenile man dashed in and addressed his opening line to Tanner. Klein withdrew to the background, where he arranged the decanter and the glasses on a tray, preparatory to the next piece of business. The dialogue between the other men continued. Both poured out their drinks. Metcalfe, posing dramatically before the table, proposed a toast. But the toast was never drunk. Hardly had the words left Metcalfe’s lips when he reeled slightly; the muscles in his throat contracted violently. The glass slipped from his fingers and crashed upon the surface of the polished table. A strange hush fell upon the scene, and in the silence the steady hum of the calciums came like the droning of a million bees.