'Sh! She's not a patch on you; it's the sort of thing we say to our sitters to keep them in good humour. (He surveys ruefully a great stain on her frock.) I wish to heaven, Margaret, we were not both so fond of apple-tart. And what's this? (Catching hold of her skirt.)
MARGARET (unnecessarily). It's a tear.
DEARTH. I should think it is a tear.
MARGARET. That boy at the farm did it. He kept calling Snubs after me, but I got him down and kicked him in the stomach. He is rather a jolly boy.
DEARTH. He sounds it. Ye Gods, what a night!
MARGARET (considering the picture). And what a moon! Dad, she is not quite so fine as that.
DEARTH. 'Sh! I have touched her up.
MARGARET. Dad, Dad--what a funny man!
(She has seen MR. COADE with whistle, enlivening the wood. He pirouettes round them and departs to add to the happiness of others. MARGARET gives an excellent imitation of him at which her father shakes his head, then reprehensibly joins in the dance. Her mood changes, she clings to him.)
MARGARET. Hold me tight, Daddy, I 'm frightened. I think they want to take you away from me.
DEARTH. Who, gosling?
MARGARET. I don't know. It's too lovely, Daddy; I won't be able to keep hold of it.
DEARTH. What is?
MARGARET. The world--everything--and you, Daddy, most of all. Things that are too beautiful can't last.
DEARTH (who knows it). Now, how did you find that out?
MARGARET (still in his arms). I don't know, Daddy, am I sometimes stranger than other people's daughters?
DEARTH. More of a madcap, perhaps.
MARGARET (solemnly). Do you think I am sometimes too full of gladness?
DEARTH. My sweetheart, you do sometimes run over with it. (He is at his easel again.)
MARGARET (persisting). To be very gay, dearest dear, is so near to being very sad.
DEARTH (who knows it). How did you find that out, child?
MARGARET. I don't know. From something in me that's afraid. (Unexpectedly.) Daddy, what is a 'might-have-been?'
DEARTH. A might-have-been? They are ghosts, Margaret. I daresay I 'might have been' a great swell of a painter, instead of just this uncommonly happy nobody. Or again, I might have been a worthless idle waster of a fellow.
MARGARET (laughing). You!
DEARTH. Who knows? Some little kink in me might have set me off on the wrong road. And that poor soul I might so easily have been might have had no Margaret. My word, I'm sorry for him.
MARGARET. So am I. (She conceives a funny picture.) The poor old Daddy, wandering about the world without me!
DEARTH. And there are other 'might-have-beens'--lovely ones, but intangible. Shades, Margaret, made of sad folk's thoughts.
MARGARET (jigging about). I am so glad I am not a shade. How awful it would be, Daddy, to wake up and find one wasn't alive.
DEARTH. It would, dear.
MARGARET. Daddy, wouldn't it be awful. I think men need daughters.
DEARTH. They do.
MARGARET. Especially artists.
DEARTH. Yes, especially artists.
MARGARET. Especially artists.
DEARTH. Especially artists.
MARGARET (covering herself with leaves and kicking them off). Fame is not everything.
DEARTH. Fame is rot; daughters are the thing.
MARGARET. Daughters are the thing.
DEARTH. Daughters are the thing.
MARGARET. I wonder if sons would be even nicer?
DEARTH. Not a patch on daughters. The awful thing about a son is that never, never--at least, from the day he goes to school--can you tell him that you rather like him. By the time he is ten you can't even take him on your knee. Sons are not worth having, Margaret. Signed W. Dearth.
MARGARET. But if you were a mother, Dad, I daresay he would let you do it.
DEARTH. Think so?
MARGARET. I mean when no one was looking. Sons are not so bad. Signed, M. Dearth. But I'm glad you prefer daughters. (She works her way toward him on her knees, making the tear larger.) At what age are we nicest, Daddy? (She has constantly to repeat her questions, he is so engaged with his moon.) Hie, Daddy, at what age are we nicest? Daddy, hie, hie, at what age are we nicest?
DEARTH.