"Half an hour ago," she says, "I had not one thing to hope for, or to live for, save the restoration of Daisy Warburton, for I believed myself accursed. Rebel as my soul would, while your lips repeated your claim upon me I could not escape you. While you persisted in your lies, I was helpless. Now--" Mamma's hands work convulsively; her eyes glitter dangerously; she looks like a cat about to spring upon its prey. As Leslie pauses thus abruptly, her lips emit a sharp hiss, but before words can follow, a heavy hand grasps her arm. "Go on," says Franz coolly; "now?" "Do you know the proposition that woman has just made me?" asks Leslie abruptly. "'Twon't be good for her, if she has made ye a proposition I don't know on," says Franz grimly, and tightening his clutch upon Mamma's arm. "An' fer fear of any hocus-pocus, suppose you jest go over it fer my benefit." "She has told me that you can, if you will, restore Daisy Warburton to her home." "No? has she?" "That you, and you only, know where to look for the child." "Umph!" "And that you will restore the child only on one condition." "And wot's that?" "That I consent to marry you." "Wal," says Franz, turning a facetious look upon Mamma, and giving her arm a gentle shake; "the old un may have trifled with the truth, here and there, but she's right in the main. How did the proposition strike ye?" Leslie turns from him and fixes her gaze upon the old woman. "And this," she says, "is the man you would mate me with! Woman, you have overreached yourself. Believing, or fearing, myself to be _your_ child, I might have been driven to any act of desperation. You have lifted that burden of horror from off my heart. I am _not_ your child! No blood of yours poisons my veins! Do you think in the moment when I find the taint removed, I would doubly defile myself by taking the step you have proposed? Never! Your power over me is gone!" "Do ye mean," queries Franz quite coolly, "that you won't take up with the old woman's bargain?" "She _has_ done it!" cries Mamma fiercely. "She's given her promise!" "And I now retract it!" "What!" Mamma suddenly wrenches herself free and springs toward Leslie. "You won't marry Franz?" "Never! The fear which has made me a coward is gone. I shall go back to my own. I will tell my story far and wide. I feared nothing so much as the shame of being pointed out as the child of such parents. You will not dare repeat that imposture; I defy you. As for little Daisy, I will find her; I will punish you--" "You will find her!" Mamma's voice is horrible in its hoarse rage. "Now mark my words: You will _never_ find her. She will never see daylight again. As for _you_, you will marry Franz Francoise to-morrow, or you will go out of this place between two officers, arrested as the murderess of Josef Siebel!"