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.

DUVALLET. [rising quickly] That is impossible, mademoiselle. Your father
has his position to consider. To turn his daughter out of doors would
ruin him socially.

KNOX. Oh, youve put her up to that, have you? And where did you come in,
may I ask?

DUVALLET. I came in at your invitation--at your amiable insistence, in
fact, not at my own. But you need have no anxiety on my account. I
was concerned in the regrettable incident which led to your daughter's
incarceration. I got a fortnight without the option of a fine on the
ridiculous ground that I ought to have struck the policeman with my
fist. I should have done so with pleasure had I known; but, as it was,
I struck him on the ear with my boot--a magnificent _moulinet_, I must
say--and was informed that I had been guilty of an act of cowardice,
but that for the sake of the _entente cordiale_ I should be dealt with
leniently. Yet Miss Knox, who used her fist, got a month, but with the
option of a fine. I did not know this until I wa