On the night of the inspectors visit Gerald proposed to Sheila, and Shelia gleefully accepted, they only became partners because of their family’s similar wealth and social status. Gerald is a businessman and a member of a family with higher social class than the Birling's. He is like Mr. Birling in many ways, immediately trying to hide his involvement with Eva. The difference is that Gerald unlike Mr. Birling feels remorse for what he has done.
Eric is the youngest of the group. He is a drunk and a thief. In the eyes of his father he is a failure as he will never make as much money as his father has done; money is the only important thing to his father. Eric particularly disagrees with his father over the reason for not giving workers more money. Eric finds his father unapproachable and particularly heartless.
Inspector Goole is a strong persuasive man. The audience and the other actors never learn much about him except his name and that he is new. His name Goole, this is a pun on 'ghoul'. This gives him the image of him being some kind of a spirit sent on behalf of Eva to torment them for what they have done to her.
Near the end of Act 2, Mrs. Birling describes how she was justified for turning Eva down, when she applied for help. Mrs. Birling stated that it should have been the father who supports her, and he should have been ‘compelled’ to marry her. But of course the audience know that the father is Eric, Mrs, Birling’s ‘innocent’ son. Mrs. Birling wouldn’t allow her son to marry a girl of Eva’s class, and the tension increases as the audience know that Mrs. Birling would soon find out who the father of Eva’s child is. Her vindictive attitude to the father of Eva's child changes instantly when she soon learns that the father is her own darling innocent little boy Eric, this clearly portrays her excessive hypocrisy. She tries to frighten the Inspector with her husband’s social class but this fails and she becomes paranoid, and criticizes her husband for beginning it by sacking her.
In the stage directions it shows that the Inspector intimidates the person he is interviewing by looking hard at the person before speaking. This tactic works to the extent that no one dares to challenge his version of the story while he is present. He manages to get the Birling’s and Gerald to reveal everything that they knew about Eva. Those who decided not to tell the inspector everything they knew suffered the most. When Mrs. Birling tries to resist telling the inspector everything she knows about Eva the inspector is very harsh on her. The audience get a sense that the inspector knows everything, and his anger increases (along with the suspense) when Mrs. Birling denies her actions upon Eva, and lied about what Eva said, ‘a lot of silly nonsense’ said Mrs. Birling hoping the investigator would not continue to question her. This gives us the feeling that Eva had a good reason for not accepting the money from the father as Mrs. Birling does not want to tell the inspector, as it will make her look indecent for refusing her charity. When the Inspector loses his patience he says ‘What did she say?’. Priestly indicated that the inspector should say this in a low intimidating voice as if he was frightening her into telling the truth about what Eva said. The inspector was also asserting his authority; he had become impatient with Mrs. Birling’s short answers which weren’t telling him what he wanted to hear. Mrs. Birling was deliberately distant with the inspector over what Eva said. Priestly is trying to make the audience dislike Mrs. Birling as she is made out to be very pompous and dishonest. Later on in act the inspector was asking her many questions so she would hesitate and finally give in. This confrontation between Mrs. Birling and the inspector was very tense as Mrs. Birling was retaliating to the inspector’s harsh questions.
The inspector was putting a lot of pressure on Mrs. Birling, and she was forced to tell her story clearly. Before the inspector expressed his anger, Mrs. Birling thought herself as a stronger or equal force to the inspector, and saw no need to tell the truth. Then the inspector marked his authority. Mrs. Birling got the message and cowed away, also the inspector had silenced Mr. Birling by roaring ‘Don’t stammer and yammer at me again, man’ as Mr. Birling went to protest at one of the inspectors statements. This tells us that the inspector is the most powerful and dominant force in the house. Following this, the suspense rises as Mrs. Birling is compelled to tell the truth. When she does so, she explained how Eva was describing the father of the child. This description was ‘a youngster – silly and wild and drinking too much’. This matched Mr. and Mrs. Birling’s son Eric, the audience would have realised but the actors didn’t. This is a good use of dramatic irony and keeps the suspense going in the act.
Mrs. Birling accepted no responsibility for what happened to the girl, and heavily shifted the blame to the father of Eva’s child, and accuses him of being ‘a young idler’ and stating he was of a lower class’. This is when the suspense begins to reach a peak, as she is putting down her son, and saying things she would never dream of saying if she new the father was her son, Eric. This shows how hypocritical Mrs. Birling is, and the audience know that Mrs. Birling will be shocked and won’t accept it when she realises, this may be seen as humorous by the audience as they will dislike her, and she is extremely pompous.
When the inspector attempted to plant the idea into Mrs. Birling’s head that she may be responsible for the girls suicide, she immediately replied with a foolish response that defended herself. Also, she continued to not tell a clear story of the event, which was greatly irritating the inspector, as he just wanted her to learn her lesson, and regret her actions against Eva.
After the inspector analysed Mrs. Birling’s statement he pronounced ‘So he’s the chief culprit anyhow’, he intended to rub it in, and expected an answer from Mrs. Birling. She said ‘certainly. And he ought to be dealt with very severely’. Mrs. Birling was relieved when she said this, she thought that she had escaped and was off the hook, but really she was digging her own grave and was soon to be humiliated.
This is when Sheila suddenly realised and exclaimed ‘mother-stop-stop!’ to halt her in embarrassing herself. Mr. Birling thought Sheila was misbehaving (he doesn’t often respect the opinions of youngsters), he bellowed at Sheila to be quiet as he assumed she was interrupting for no apparent reason. Sheila was exceptionally shocked at the thought of Eric being the father to Eva’s child – and stealing money to support her. There was nothing Sheila could do about it except cry, and nobody questioned the reason for why she was crying which kept the suspense going in the scene. Also, she couldn’t just scream out ‘Eric is the father of Eva’s child’ because the tension would come to an end, and Mrs. Birling wouldn’t be able to get herself into more of a messy situation. Mrs. Birling is an unpopular and disliked character by the audience, therefore J.B. Priestly wanted to continue the audiences schadenfreude towards her. Sheila is a popular character who is intellectual, therefore she was the first out of the Birlings to comprehend that Eric is the father.
Following Sheila’s attempt to stop her mother, Mrs. Birling was keen to dispose of the inspector. This is because she now thought she was off the hook and wanted to prevent him from asking more questions and realising she was unjust in her actions. Therefore, she suggested that the inspector should seek the father of Eva’s child. The inspector then dropped hints and attempted to reveal that the young man was Eric, the audience would be on the edge of their seats waiting for the suspense to reach its climax. She is unrealistic and foolish in the manner that she would not accept the father to be her son, therefore it was a fairly long time before she grasped it.
She would have paused for a moment as she was thinking of all the embarrassment it would cause her if Eric is indeed the father of Eva's child. She then turned on the Inspector and viciously accused him of lying saying 'it's ridiculous' before turning to her husband to look for help. The whole feeling terrified Mr. Birling before he himself, hoping that it's not all true asked the Inspector if Eric is the father of Eva's child. He then says ‘...you're not trying to tell us - that my boy - is mixed up in this’. He would have said the words 'my boy' very loudly giving the impression that he cannot except that his darling little son Eric could do such a disgraceful thing as impregnate a low social class woman and fund her by stealing from him. This suggests how uppish and presumptuous Mr. Birling is about himself and his family. It also shows how ironic the Birlings are: they don't believe Eric has an alcohol problem, and that there son could steel from them and get Eva pregnant. The suspense had come to a near end here, as they now know, and the audience can only wait for a response from Mr. and Mrs. Birling.
The inspector made it clear that he needed to be punished, which agreed with Mrs. Birling’s previous statement, nut now she was feeling intensely awkward, discomfited and conscience – stricken, she now had nothing to say that could defend Eric. Then the tension builds up as the inspector decided to punish and rub it in to Mr. and Mrs. Birling by sternly saying ‘we know what to do, don’t we?’. He was referring to Mrs. Birling’s previous statement which mentioned how the young man should be severely punished. Mrs. Birling was speechless, therefore Mr. Birling suddenly had a hesitant outburst in which he intended to defend Eric, but was unable to come up with an apparent reason that would defend his case.
As the Birlings were silenced there was not much happening and it wasn’t very lively. Consequently, this was an ideal time in the scene for the anxiety to have a sudden upsurge, thus, Eric would return to the Birling household. The scene ends on a suspense cliff-hanger. It is unpredictable how the Birlings will react, they may be annoyed for Eric impregnating a lower class woman and stealing money from his father, or they may be softer on him, taking in mind how harsh they, themselves treated Eva. Either way the audience knows that the inspector will bring Eric down, but they don’t know how Eric will react, and are ready to hear Eric’s story.
In this scene there are three confrontations. The main one is between the inspector and Mrs. Birling, where the inspector endeavours in making her realise she was unfair in dismissing Eva’s plea for help. Then there is the conflict between the inspector and Mr. Birling, where Mr. Birling makes attempts to defend his family. The last one is between Sheila and her parents. Sheila doesn’t have a great part in the scene but she made a great impact by attempting to stop her mother from getting into trouble.
J.B. Priestly was a socialist, and believed that if everyone in the world was treated equally then it would be much more peaceful and better place to live in. In the scene there was sufficient evidence of Mrs. Birling showing prejudice toward lower class citizens, mainly when she was referring to Eva. This is one of the reasons why she was treated and punished very severely by the inspector. This is a reason for why the scene was so tense, because the inspector and Mrs. Birling are both very different people fighting for different beliefs.
