Knox returns with a good-looking young marine officer.

MARGARET.  Oh, Monsieur Duvallet, I’m so sorry—­so ashamed.  Mother:  this is Monsieur Duvallet, who has been extremely kind to me.  Monsieur Duvallet:  my mother. [Duvallet bows].

KNOX.  A Frenchman!  It only needed this.

MARGARET. [much annoyed] Father:  do please be commonly civil to a gentleman who has been of the greatest service to me.  What will he think of us?

DUVALLET. [debonair] But it’s very natural.  I understand Mr Knox’s feelings perfectly. [He speaks English better than Knox, having learnt it on both sides of the Atlantic].

KNOX.  If Ive made any mistake I’m ready to apologize.  But I want to know where my daughter has been for the last fortnight.

DUVALLET.  She has been, I assure you, in a particularly safe place.

KNOX.  Will you tell me what place?  I can judge for myself how safe it was.

MARGARET.  Holloway Gaol.  Was that safe enough?

KNOX AND MRS KNOX.  Holloway Gaol!

KNOX.  Youve joined the Suffragets!

MARGARET.  No.  I wish I had.  I could have had the same experience in better company.  Please sit down, Monsieur Duvallet. [She sits between the table and the sofa.  Mrs Knox, overwhelmed, sits at the other side of the table.  Knox remains standing in the middle of the room].

DUVALLET. [sitting down on the sofa] It was nothing.  An adventure.  Nothing.

MARGARET. [obdurately] Drunk and assaulting the police!  Forty shillings or a month!

MRS KNOX.  Margaret!  Who accused you of such a thing?

MARGARET.  The policeman I assaulted.

KNOX.  You mean to say that you did it!

MARGARET.  I did.  I had that satisfaction at all events.  I knocked two of his teeth out.

KNOX.  And you sit there coolly and tell me this!

MARGARET.  Well, where do you want me to sit?  Whats the use of saying things like that?

KNOX.  My daughter in Holloway Gaol!

MARGARET.  All the women in Holloway are somebody’s daughters.  Really, father, you must make up your mind to it.  If you had sat in that cell for fourteen days making up your mind to it, you would understand that I’m not in the humor to be gaped at while youre trying to persuade yourself that it cant be real.  These things really do happen to real people every day; and you read about them in the papers and think it’s all right.  Well, theyve happened to me:  thats all.

KNOX. [feeble-forcible] But they shouldnt have happened to you. 
Dont you know that?

MARGARET.  They shouldnt happen to anybody, I suppose.  But they do. [Rising impatiently] And really I’d rather go out and assault another policeman and go back to Holloway than keep talking round and round it like this.  If youre going to turn me out of the house, turn me out:  the sooner I go the better.