Margaret}

(_Interrupting, bitterly._) The thefts and lies and all common
little sins like adulteries are not to stand in the way of your
high duties--that the end hallows the means.

{Starkweather}

(_Shortly._) Precisely.

{Margaret}

(_To Rutland._) There is Jesuitism, Mr. Rutland. I would suggest
that you, as my father's spiritual adviser--

{Starkweather}

Enough of this foolery. Give me the papers.

{Margaret}

I haven't them.

{Starkweather}

What's to be done, Hubbard?

{Hubbard}

She has them. She has as much as acknowledged that they are not
elsewhere in the room. She has not been out of the room. There is
nothing to do but search her.

{Starkweather}

Nothing else remains to be done. Dobleman, and you, Hubbard, take
her behind the screen. Strip her. Recover the papers.

(_Dobleman is in a proper funk, but Hubbard betrays no
unwillingness._)

{Chalmers}

No; that I shall not permit. Hubbard shall have nothing to do
with this.

{Margaret}

It is too late, Tom. You have stood by and allowed me to be
stripped of everything else. A few clothes do not matter now. If
I am to be stripped and searched by men, Mr. Hubbard will serve
as well as any other man. Perhaps Mr. Rutland would like to lend
his assistance.

{Connie}

Oh, Madge! Give them up.

(_Margaret shakes her head._)

(_To Starkweather._) Then let me search her, father.

{Starkweather}

You are too willing. I don't want volunteers. I doubt that I can
trust you any more than your sister.

{Connie}

Let mother, then.

{Starkweather}

(_Sneering._) Margaret could smuggle a steamer-trunk of documents
past her.

{Connie}

But not the men, father! Not the men!

{Starkweather}

Why not? She has shown herself dead to all shame.

(_Imperatively._) Dobleman!

{Dobleman}

(_Thinking his time has come, and almost dying._) Y-y-yes, sir.

{Starkweather}

Call in the servants.

{Mrs. Starkweather}

(_Crying out in protest._) Anthony!

{Starkweather}

Would you prefer her to be searched by the men?

{Mrs. Starkweather}

(_Subsiding._) I shall die, I shall die. I know I shall die.

{Starkweather}

Dobleman. Ring for the servants.

(_Dobleman, who has been hesitant, crosses to desk and pushes
button, then returns toward door._) Send in the maids and the
housekeeper.

(_Linda, blindly desiring to be of some assistance, starts
impulsively toward Margaret._) Stand over there--in the corner.

(_Indica