MR. PUSHINGTON. Oh, but really, you know, in Charades one gets carried away at times. I assure you, I hadn't the remotest (_&c, &c._--_until_ Miss Buckram _is partly mollified_.) Now then--last syllable. Look here, I'll be a regular impostor, don't you know, and all of you come on and say what a _liar_ I am. We ought to make that screamingly funny! AFTER THE THIRD SYLLABLE. MR. PUSHINGTON. Muddled? Of _course_ it was muddled--you all called me a liar before I opened my mouth! THE REST. But you didn't seem to know how to begin, and we _had_ to bring the Word in somehow. PUSHINGTON. Bring it in?--but you needn't have let it _out_. There was Settee there, shouting "liar" till he was black in the face. We must have looked a set of idiots from the front. I sha'n't go in again (_muttering_). It's no use acting Charades with people who don't understand it. There; settle the Word yourselves! AFTER THE WORD. AMONG THE AUDIENCE. GENERAL MURMUR. What _can_ it be? Not _Turk_, I suppose, or Magician?--Quarrelling?--Parnellite--Impertinence? Shall we give it up? No, they like us to guess, poor things; and besides, if we don't they'll do another; and it is getting _so_ late, and such a _long_ drive home. Oh, they're all coming back; then it _is_ over. No, indeed, we can't _imagine_. "_Familiar!_" To be sure--_how_ clever, and _how_ well you all acted it, to be sure--you must be quite tired after it all. I am sure _we_--hem--are deeply indebted to you.... My dear Miss Rose, how wonderfully you disguised yourself, I never recognized you a bit, nor _you_, Mr. Nightingale. What part did _you_ take? MR. NIGHTINGALE. I--er--didn't take any particular part--wasn't wanted, you know. MISS ROSE. Not to _act_,--so we stayed outside and--and--arranged things. AN OLD LADY. Indeed? Then you had all the hard work, and none of the pleasure, my dear, I'm afraid. MISS ROSE (_sweetly_). Oh no. I mean yes!--but we didn't _mind_ it much. THE O. L. And which of you settled what the Word was to be? MR. N. Well, I believe we settled that together. [_Carriages are announced; departure of guests who are not of the house-party. In the Smoking-room_, MR. PUSHINGTON _discovers that he does not seem exactly popular with the other men, and puts it down to jealousy_. A Christmas Romp. SCENE--MRS. CHIPPERFIELD'S _Drawing-room_. _It is after the Christmas dinner, and the Gentlemen have not yet appeared._ MRS. C. _is laboriously attempting to be gracious to her Brother's Fiancée, whose acquaintance she has made for the first time, and with whom she is disappointed_. _Married Sisters and Maiden Aunts confer in corners with a sleepy acidity._