e law.

A group of hardened rounders follows. These are men to whom the Cafe
Sinister and the district have become a habit. They bring with them women
of their own kind--women who, through years of dissipation, have still,
like misers, managed to hoard some trace of bloom. They drink deeply, for
the men are spenders. The wine flows free and the talk grows loud.
Occasionally a man quarrels profanely with his companion and a
soft-footed waiter with a thug's face whispers him to sullen silence.

An hour flies by. Now the Levee, roused from its sodden, day-long
slumber, is wide awake. The way between the twin pillars at the Cafe
Sinister's entrance is choked with the flood of merry-makers. These
newcomers are not so easy to classify as their predecessors. They are the
crowd from the street,--the thief with his girl pal, eager to spend the
plunder of their last successful exploit; the big corporation's
entertainer, out to show a party of country customers the sights of a
great city; the visitor from afar, lonely and seeking excitement; the man
about town, the respectable woman who with a trusted male confidant seeks
shady and clandestine amusement; college students with unspoiled
appetites off for a lark; women of the district still new enough to the
life of vice to find pleasure in its excitements; periodical drinkers out
for a night of it; clerks, cashiers, bookkeepers, schoolboys and roues.

And here and there, weaving in and out through this heterogeneous mob
lurks the pander seeking for his prey--the ignorant young girl, trembling
on the verge of her first step into the depths, the little lost sister of
tomorrow.

By ten o'clock the merry making in the Cafe Sinister had attained the
vociferousness of a riot. As the swift-footed waiters passed more and
more liquor about, the voices of the speakers rose higher and higher. At
last the orchestra itself could scarcely be heard. The singers, half
maudlin themselves, and knowing they could not be heard above the
universal din, abandoned harmony and resorted to shouts and suggestive
gyrations. A woman fell helplessly into the arms of her escort who,
gloating, winked knowingly at a male companion. Another drunkenly
attempted to dance and was restrained by the waiters. An elderly
reprobate, convoying two unsteady young girls, importuned Druce for one
of his private dining rooms.

Druce and Anson watched over the revelers and directed the entertainers.
"The Mastiff," comforta