Downton Abbey: Lord Grantham finesses the coppers who show up to question Evil Gay Footman Thomas

Last night's penultimate Season Three episode was a fast-paced, two-hour wrap up of many lingering plot lines and perhaps the most exhilarating episode so far. Queerty's exhaustive recap does it justice — except for the part where it playfully claimed that Lord Grantham told the police "that he’s just made up a new law about how gay kissing is just fine by him."
     Actually, he told the cops that Alfred mistook roughhousing for something else and that he called them when he was "squiffy" (drunk) and that he was terribly sorry that their time was wasted and would they like some tea?
     As usual, Maggie Smith got ALMOST all the best lines; the acidic bickering between Violet and Isobel was simply the best. Sample:

Violet Crawley, Dowager Countess of Grantham: One forgets about parenthood. The on-and-on-ness of it.
Isobel Crawley: Were you a very involved mother with Robert and Rosamund?
Violet: Does it surprise you?
Isobel: A bit. I'd imagined them surrounded by nannies and governesses, being starched and ironed to spend an hour with you after tea.
Violet: Yes, but it was an hour every day.
Isobel: [momentarily lost for words] I see, yes. How tiring!