Cast
Edgar 1
Edgar 2
Bartimaeus Tintoes
Helene
Essay Reader 1
Essay Reader 2
Essay Reader 3

(Edgar 1 sits facing the audience and addresses the audience only. Edgar 2 stands next to him, but speaks to himself and the other characters in the play. Helene and Essay Readers 1-3 sit at center and stand when they "enter")

Edgar 1: I rubbed my eyes and looked at the letter a second time. Yes, I was not asleep; the thing had happened. There was my cup of coffee and the half-eaten donut just as I had left them when I went to get the mail. There was the other letter that had come, still unopened, and here was this one from a firm of lawyers I had never heard of. The sum and substance of it was this - my old neighbor, John Dolby, whose funeral I had just attended two days before, had made me the s…