FRANCIS (grasping him tight). I will throttle you till you are black in the face, you hoary-headed liar! Nothing? Why, then, are you so often closeted together? He, and you, and Amelia? And what are you always whispering about? Out with it! What secrets, eh? What secrets has he confided to you?
DANIEL. I call the Almighty to witness that he has not confided any secrets to me.
FRANCIS. Do you mean to deny it? What schemes have you been hatching to get rid of me? Am I to be smothered in my sleep? or is my throat to be cut in shaving? or am I to be poisoned in wine or chocolate? Eh? Out with it, out with it! Or am I to have my quietus administered in my soup? Out with it! I know it all!
DANIEL. May heaven so help me in the hour of need as I now tell you the truth, and nothing but the pure, unvarnished truth!
FRANCIS. Well, this time I will forgive you. But the money! he most certainly put money into your purse? And he pressed your hand more warmly than is customary? something in the manner of an old acquaintance?
DANIEL. Never, indeed, Sir.
FRANCIS. He told you, for instance, that he had known you before? that you ought to know him? that the scales would some day fall from your eyes? that—what? Do you mean to say that he never spoke thus to you?
DANIEL. Not a word of the kind.
FRANCIS. That certain circumstances restrained him—that one must sometimes wear a mask in order to get at one's enemies—that he would be revenged, most terribly revenged?
DANIEL. Not a syllable of all this.