Ellie pours out a cup greedily.
THE CAPTAIN. Your tea, young lady. What! another lady! I must
fetch another cup [he makes for the pantry].
LADY UTTERWORD [rising from the sofa, suffused with emotion].
Papa! Don't you know me? I'm your daughter.
THE CAPTAIN. Nonsense! my daughter's upstairs asleep. [He
vanishes through the half door].
Lady Utterword retires to the window to conceal her tears.
ELLIE [going to her with the cup]. Don't be so distressed. Have
this cup of tea. He is very old and very strange: he has been
just like that to me. I know how dreadful it must be: my own
father is all the world to me. Oh, I'm sure he didn't mean it.
The captain returns with another cup.
THE CAPTAIN. Now we are complete. [He places it on the tray].
LADY UTTERWORD [hysterically]. Papa, you can't have forgotten me.
I am Ariadne. I'm little Paddy Patkins. Won't you kiss me? [She
goes to him and throws her arms round his neck].
THE CAPTAIN [woodenly enduring her embrace]. How can you be
Ariadne? You are a middle-aged woman: well preserved, madam, but
no longer young.
LADY UTTERWORD. But think of all the years and years I have been
away, Papa. I have had to grow old, like other people.
THE CAPTAIN [disengaging himself]. You should grow out of kissing
strange men: they may be striving to attain the seventh degree of
concentration.
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