CHARLEY. [irritably.] I’m not grieving over him, if that’s what you mean.

MAGGIE. As if I did! and as if you’d confess if you were. Are you sick of everything?

CHARLEY. Sick! I’d cut the whole beastly show tomorrow if— [He stops suddenly.]

LILY’S voice can be heard distinctly from the front room.

LILY. Well, we’ll ask Mr. Tennant to sing first.

SYBIL. Oh, I can’t sing, really—

CHARLEY. Why doesn’t the girl sing when she’s asked?

MAGGIE. She says she has a cold. [She laughs a little.]

CHARLEY. Rot! Affectation, I call it.