“Real, child? The theatre, and plays, and make-believe every day?”
“It’s the only thing that’s real. You’d know that if you were an artist. It means what’s true—that’s what it means. Do you mean to tell me there’s anything real in all the putting on here in this house—the way you hide what you mean and what you believe and what you want? Here’s where the make-believe is: just a mean make-believe that nothing comes of. The theatre has a make-believe that everybody understands, and so it really isn’t a make-believe, and something good and true comes of it.”
Her eyes were flashing. Her hands had been clasped while she spoke until she came to the final clause. Then she thrust her arms forward as if she would grasp the good and true thing which came of the make-believe she had defended.
When Baron spoke again his words came slowly. “Bonnie May,” he said, “I wish that you and I might try, like good friends, to understand each other, and not to say or think anything bitter or unkind. Maybe there will be things I can teach you. I’m sure there are things you can teach me! And the others ... I honestly believe that when we all get better acquainted we’ll love one another truly.”
She hung her head pensively a moment, and then, suddenly, she laughed heartily, ecstatically.
“What is it?” he asked, vaguely troubled.
“I’m thinking it’s certainly a pretty kettle of fish I’ve got into. That’s all.”
“You know I don’t quite understand that.”
“The Sunday-school, I mean, and your mother, and everything. They put me in with a lot of children”—this somewhat scornfully—“and a sort of leading lady asked us riddles—is that what you call them? One of them was: ‘How long did it take to make the world?’”
“But that wasn’t a riddle.”