"I think I can see a way," she begins. Then, at the sound of an uncertain footstep on the rickety stairs, she stops to listen. "That's her," she says, a frown darkening her face. "She's got to be kept off the street." She goes to the door, opens it with an angry movement, and peers out into the dark hall. "Nance, you torment!" But the head that appears above the stair-railing is not the head of a female, and it is a masculine voice that says, in an undertone: "Sh-h! Old woman, let me in, and don't make a fuss." The woman starts back and is about to close the door, when something in the appearance of the man arrests her attention. As he halts at the top of the stairway, the light from the door reveals to her a shock of close-curling, carroty-red hair. In another moment he stands with a hand on either door-post. [Illustration: "How are ye, old uns? Governor, how are ye?"--page 194.] "How are ye' old uns?" he says, with a grin. "Governor, how are ye?" And then, with a leer, and a lurch which betrays the fact that he is half intoxicated, he adds, in a voice indicative of stupid astonishment: "Why, I'm blowed, the blessed old fakers don't know their own young un!" "Franzy!" Mamma Francoise starts forward, a look of mingled doubt and anxiety upon her face. "Franzy! No, it can't be Franzy!" "Why can't it be? Ain't ten years in limbo enough? Or ain't I growed as handsome as ye expected to see me?" Then coming into the room, and peering closely into the faces of the two: "I'm blessed if I don't resemble the rest of the family, anyhow." The two Francoises drew close together, and scrutinized the new-comer keenly, doubtfully, with suspicion. Ten years ago, their son, Franzy, then a beardless boy of seventeen, and a worthy child of his parents, had reluctantly turned his back upon the outer world and assumed a prison garb, to serve out a twenty years' sentence for the crime of manslaughter. Ten years had elapsed and this man, just such a man as their boy must have become, stands before them and claims them for his parents. There is little trace of the old Franz, save the carroty hair, the color of the eyes, the devil-may-care manner, and the reckless speech. And after a prolonged gaze, Papa says, still hesitatingly: "Franzy! is it really Franzy?" The new claimant to parental affection flings out his hand with a fierce gesture, and a horrible oath breaks from his lips. "Is it _really_ Franzy?" he cries, derisively. "Who else do ye think would be likely to claim _yer_ kinship? I've put in ten years in the stripes, an' I'm about as proud of ye as I was of my ball and chain. I've taken the trouble ter hunt ye up, with the police hot on my trail; maybe ye don't want ter own the son as might a-been a decent man but for yer teachin'. Well, I ain't partikeler; I'll take myself out of yer quarters." He turns about with a firm, resentful movement, and Mamma Francoise springs forward with a look of conviction on her hard face.