draped in an
old-fashioned circular waterproof belonging to Mrs. M'Cosh, stood with
arms folded looking at him, while Mhor, almost denuded of clothing, and
supported by Peter (who sat with his back to the audience to show his
thorough disapproval of the proceedings), stood at one side.

When the murmured comments of the spectators had ceased, Mhor, looking
extraordinarily Roman, held up his hand as if appealing to a raging mob,
and said, "Peace, ho! Let us hear him," whereupon Jock, breathing
heavily in his brother's face, proceeded to give Antony's oration over
Caesar. He did it very well, and the Mhor as the Mob supplied
appropriate growls at intervals; indeed, so much did Antony's eloquence
inspire Mhor that, when Jock shouted, "Light the pyre!" (a sentence
introduced to bring in the charade word), instead of merely pretending
with an unlighted taper, Mhor dashed to the fire, lit the taper, and
before anyone could stop him thrust it among the dry twigs, which at
once began to light and crackle. Immediately all was confusion. "Mhor!"
shouted Jean, as she sprang towards the stage. "Gosh, Maggie!" Jock
yelled, as he grabbed the burning twigs, but it was "Imperial Caesar,
dead and turned to clay," who really put out the fire by rolling on it
wrapped in an eiderdown quilt.

"Eh, ye ill callant," said Bella Bathgate.

"Ye wee deevil," said Mrs. M'Cosh, "ye micht hev had us a' burned where
we sat, and it Christmas too!"

"What made you do it, sonny?" Jean asked.

"It made it so real," Mhor explained, "and I knew we could always throw
them out of the window if they really blazed. What's the use of having a
funeral pyre if you don't light it?"

The actors departed to prepare for the next performance Jock coming back
to put his head in at the door to ask if they had guessed the first part
of the word.

Jean said she thought it must be incendiarism.

"Funeral," said Miss Watson brightly.

"Huch," said Jock; "it's a word of one syllable."

"I think," Jean said as the door shut on Jock--I think I know what the
word is--pyre."

"Oh, really," said Miss Watson, "I'm all shaking yet with the fright I
got. He's an awful bad wee boy that--sort of regardless. He needs a man
to look after him."

"I'll never forget," said Miss Teenie, "once I was staying with a friend
of ours, a doctor; his mother and our mother were cousins, you know, and
when I looked--I was doing my hair at the time--I found that the curtain
had blown