bureau, and wardrobe to match.  A large, square mirror in a gold frame was hung over the washstand.  Some poor engravings of landscapes and several nude figures were hung in gold frames on the wall.  The gilt-framed chairs were upholstered in pink-and-white-flowered brocade, with polished brass tacks.  The carpet was of thick Brussels, pale cream and pink in hue, with large blue jardinieres containing flowers woven in as ornaments.  The general effect was light, rich, and a little stuffy.

“You know I get desperately frightened, sometimes,” said Aileen.  “Father might be watching us, you know.  I’ve often wondered what I’d do if he caught us.  I couldn’t lie out of this, could I?”

“You certainly couldn’t,” said Cowperwood, who never failed to respond to the incitement of her charms.  She had such lovely smooth arms, a full, luxuriously tapering throat and neck; her golden-red hair floated like an aureole about her head, and her large eyes sparkled.  The wondrous vigor of a full womanhood was hers—­errant, ill-balanced, romantic, but exquisite, “but you might as well not cross that bridge until you come to it,” he continued.  “I myself have been thinking that we had better not go on with this for the present.  That letter ought to have been enough to stop us for the time.”

He came over to where she stood by the dressing-table, adjusting her hair.

“You’re such a pretty minx,” he said.  He slipped his arm about her and kissed her pretty mouth.  “Nothing sweeter than you this side of Paradise,” he whispered in her ear.

While this was enacting, Butler and the extra detective had stepped out of sight, to one side of the front door of the house, while Alderson, taking the lead, rang the bell.  A negro servant appeared.

“Is Mrs. Davis in?” he asked, genially, using the name of the woman in control.  “I’d like to see her.”

“Just come in,” said the maid, unsuspectingly, and indicated a reception-room on the right.  Alderson took off his soft, wide-brimmed hat and entered.  When the maid went up-stairs he immediately returned to the door and let in Butler and two detectives.  The four stepped into the reception-room unseen.  In a few moments the “madam” as the current word characterized this type of woman, appeared.  She was tall, fair, rugged, and not at all unpleasant to look upon.  She had light-blue eyes and a genial smile.  Long contact with the police and the brutalities of sex in her early life had made her wary, a little afraid of how the world would use her.  This particular method of making a living being illicit, and she having no other practical knowledge at her command, she was as anxious to get along peacefully with the police and the public generally as any struggling tradesman in any walk of life might have been.  She had on a loose, blue-flowered peignoir, or dressing-gown, open at the front, tied with blue ribbons and showing a little of her expensive underwear beneath.