There were critical possibilities if he did not appear.
Mike disappeared with the final fragment and Reynolds became the grievance of the hour.

Kenny, fuming aimlessly around the studio, resorted desperately at last to an unfailing means of stimulus.

He made a careful toilet, donned a coat with a foreign looking waist-line, rather high, and experimented with a new and picturesque stock that fastened beneath his tie with a jeweled link.

As six o'clock arrived and Reynolds' defection became a thing assured, his attitude toward John Whitaker underwent an imperative change.

It would be impossible now to greet him with hostile dignity.