"What sayest thou?" he murmured, only half awake. "Art mocking me? Is that a dagger in thy left hand?"
"Rise and fly, while there is yet time!" she cried again. "Thy brothers are already dead, treacherously slain by their brides. The dawn is near; soon it will be too late. Leave me; fly! I cannot bear to see thee slain!"
Then Lynceus sprang up and fled, and scarcely had he gone when Danaüs, gloating over his victims, entered to see if Hypermnestra had been obedient as her sisters. But Hypermnestra, fearful no longer, rose and faced him, holding out the bloodless dagger.
"Take back thy weapon, cruel father," she cried. "Nay, and if thou wilt, smite me therewith, slaying me with the death I would not bring upon my husband. But not in death itself shalt thou hear me say, 'I repent.'"
Strong and beautiful she stood there in the dawn, her eyes shining with triumph. But her father, enraged at the escape of one victim, struck her to the ground and ordered slaves to drag her by the hair to the palace dungeon. And not many days after, seated in the city hall of justice, he caused her to be brought before him to be sentenced for her disobedience. So slaves dragged in Hypermnestra, and she stood there before a great multitude, chains on her hands and feet, her white robe besmirched by the dungeon, but with the light of triumph still shining in her eyes. And all the people, seeing her, cried with one voice: "Spare her, O king!" and as his wrath burned yet fiercer as a fire that meets the blast, the prayer became a threat: "Spare her, thou cruel king!" But Danaüs, remembering the oracle, gnashed upon them with his teeth and rose as if to smite Hypermnestra with his own hand. But even as he rose a voice like thunder smote upon his ear: "Hold, thou cursed king!" and the crowd made way for a young warrior to pass. Like a young god, Lynceus rushed upon Danaüs and slew him at a stroke, and all the people hailed him as King over Argos, and his wife Hypermnestra as Queen.
But the guilty sisters of Hypermnestra, seeing what had chanced, fled from Argos, whither none knew or cared. And poets tell that after death their shades in Tartarus were condemned evermore to draw water in bottomless urns, a warning to all false wives and traitors; but Hypermnestra has won for herself a name that will live for all time as a maiden tender and true, who loved greatly and dared greatly.