footman, enters hurriedly and switches on the electric light. He
rushes to the table, looks eagerly around, shifting cups and
glasses, napkins, etc., then goes on his hands and knees and
searches on the carpet. After a moment,_ SMITHERS, _the
lady's-maid, follows him._

SMITHERS. [_Eagerly._] Can't you find it?

WILLIAM. [_Sulkily._] No. Not yet. Give me time.

SMITHERS. [_Feeling along the table-cloth._] Under one of those rugs,
perhaps.

WILLIAM. Well, I'm looking. [_Motor-horn sounds sharply, off._] All right,
all right!

SMITHERS. [_With a jerk of the head._] Missis is telling him to do it.

WILLIAM. [_On all fours, crawling about._] Very like her voice, too, when
she's angry. Drat the thing! Where can it be?

[_He peers into the coal-scuttle._

SMITHERS. No good looking in there, stupid.

WILLIAM. They always say it's the unlikeliest places--

[MARTIN, _the butler, comes in._

MARTIN. Come, come, haven't you found it?

WILLIAM. No, Mr. Martin. It ain't here.

MARTIN. [_Bustling about._] Must be, must be. She says--

WILLIAM. I can't help what she says. It ain't.

MARTIN. [_Looking under the sofa._] Just you hustle, young man, and don't
give me any back-answers.

[_Having completed his examination of the sofa, he moves to the
sideboard, and fusses round that._

SMITHERS. [_Methodically shaking out each napkin._] I tell you she's
cross.

MARTIN. [_Hard at work, searching._] Doesn't mind disturbing _us,_ in the
midst of our supper!

WILLIAM. [_Who, all the time, has been on all fours searching._] We're
dirt, that's what we are--dirt.

MARTIN. [_Reprovingly._] William, I've told you before--

WILLIAM. Very sorry, Mr. Martin, but this is the first time I've accepted
an engagement at a stockbroker's. [_He has been crawling round the
curtains at the back, shaking them; pulling hard at one of them he
dislodges the lower part._] Lor! _Now_ I've done it!

SMITHERS. Clumsy!

MARTIN. [_Severely._] That comes of too much talk Never mind the
curtain--go on looking.

[WILLIAM _drops on to his hands and knees again;_ HARVEY WESTERN
_comes into the room, perturbed and restless. He is a
well-preserved man of fifty._

HARVEY. I say--not found it?

MARTIN. Not yet, sir.

HARVEY. Nuisance. _Must_ be here, you know.

MARTIN. Is it a very valuable one, sir?

HARVEY. [_Who has gone to the table, and is turning things over._] No, no,
not partic