ALICK [encouragingly]. In at them, Maggie, with your French.

MAGGIE. It's all slipping from me, father.

DAVID [gloomily]. I'm sure to say 'for to come for to go.'

[The newcomers glorify the room, and MAGGIE feels that they have
lifted her up with the tongs and deposited her in one of the basins.
They are far from intending to be rude; it is not their fault that
thus do swans scatter the ducks. They do not know that they are
guests of the family, they think merely that they are waiting with
other strangers in a public room; they undulate inquiringly, and if
MAGGIE could undulate in return she would have no cause for offence.
But she suddenly realises that this is an art as yet denied her, and
that though DAVID might buy her evening-gowns as fine as theirs [and
is at this moment probably deciding to do so], she would look better
carrying them in her arms than on her person. She also feels that to
emerge from wraps as they are doing is more difficult than to plank
your money on the counter for them. The COMTESSE she could forgive,
for she is old; but LADY SYBIL is young and beautiful and comes
lazily to rest like a stately ship of Tarsus.]

COMTESSE [smiling divinely, and speaking with such a pretty accent].
I hope one is not in the way. We were told we might wait.

MAGGIE [bravely climbing out of the basin]. Certainly--I am sure if
you will be so--it is--

[She knows that DAVID and her father are very sorry for her.]