"Stop him! stop him!" shouted Uncle Morlot. "Don't let him go. He is the one that is mad; I will tell you all about it." "Calm yourself, my dear uncle," said Francis, starting toward the door. "I leave you in Dr. Auvray's care; he will soon cure you, I trust." M. Morlot sprang up to intercept his nephew, but the doctor detained him. "What a strange fatality!" cried the poor uncle. "He has not uttered a single senseless remark. If he would only rave as usual, you would soon see that I am not the one who is mad, but--" Francis already had his hand on the door-knob, but turning suddenly, he retraced his steps as if he had forgotten something and, walking straight up to the doctor, said: "My uncle's malady was not the only thing that brought me here." "Ah," murmured M. Morlot, seeing a ray of hope, at last. "You have a daughter," continued the young man. "At last!" shouted the poor uncle. "You are a witness to the fact that he said: 'You have a daughter.'" "Yes," replied the doctor, addressing Francis. "Will you kindly explain--" "You have a daughter, Mlle. Claire Auvray." "There, there! didn't I tell you so?" cried the uncle. "Yes," again replied the doctor. "She was at Ems three months ago with her mother." "Bravo! Bravo!" yelled M. Morlot. "Yes," responded the physician for the third time. M. Morlot rushed up to the doctor, and cried: "You are not the doctor, but a patient in the house." "My friend, if you are not more quiet we shall have to give you a douche." M. Morlot recoiled in terror. His nephew continued calmly: "I love your daughter, sir; I have some hope that I am loved in return, and if her feelings have not changed since the month of September, I have the honor to ask her hand in marriage." "Is it to Monsieur Francis Thomas that I have the honor of speaking?" inquired the doctor. "The same, sir. I should have begun by telling you my name." "Then you must permit me to say, sir, that you have been guilty of no unseemly haste--" But just then the good doctor's attention was diverted by M. Morlot, who was rubbing his hands in a frenzied manner. "What is the matter with you, my friend?" the doctor asked in his kind, fatherly way. "Nothing, nothing! I am only washing my hands. There is something on them that troubles me." "Show me what it is. I don't see anything." "Can't you see it? There, there, between my fingers. I see it plainly enough." "What do you see?" "My nephew's money. Take it away, doctor. I'm an honest man; I don't want anything that belongs to anybody else." While the physician was listening attentively to M. Morlot's first ravings, an extraordinary change took place in Francis. He became as pale as death, and seemed to be suffering terribly from cold, for his teeth chattered so violently that Dr. Auvray turned and asked what was the matter with him.