"Is it company you're having?" the fat, dirty janitress enquired. Mrs.
Foley was the widow of a useful Tammany man, and she owned real estate in
Flatbush. She was huge and soft as a feather bed. Her face and arms were
permanently coated with dust, grained like wood where the sweat had
trickled.

"Yes, company. That's it."

"Well, this is a queer time of the day to be asking for a cleaning woman.
It's likely I can get you old Lizzie, if she's not drunk. I'll send Willy
round to see."

Willy, the son of fourteen, roused from the stupor and stain of his fifth
box of cigarettes by the gleam of a quarter, went out. In five minutes he
returned with old Lizzie,--she smelling strong of spirits and wearing
several jackets which she had put on one over the other, and a number of
skirts, long and short, which made her resemble an animated dish-clout.
She had, of course, to borrow her equipment from Mrs. Foley, and toiled
up the long flights, dragging mop and pail and broom. She told Hedger to
be of good cheer, for he had got the right woman for the job, and showed
him a great leather strap she wore about her wrist to prevent dislocation
of tendons. She swished about the place, scattering dust and splashing
soapsuds, while he watched her in nervous despair. He stood over Lizzie
and made her scour the sink, directing her roughly, then paid her and got
rid of her. Shutting the door on his failure, he hurried off with his dog
to lose himself among the stevedores and dock labourers on West Street.

A strange chapter began for Don Hedger. Day after day, at that hour in
the afternoon, the hour before his neighbour dressed for dinner, he
crouched down in his closet to watch her go through her mysterious
exercises. It did not occur to him that his conduct was detestable; there
was nothing shy or retreating about this unclad girl,--a bold body,
studying itself quite coolly and evidently well pleased with itself,
doing all this for a purpose. Hedger scarcely regarded his action as
conduct at all; it was something that had happened to him. More than once
he went out and tried to stay away for the whole afternoon, but at about
five o'clock he was sure to find himself among his old shoes in the dark.
The pull of that aperture was stronger than his will,--and he had always
considered his will the strongest thing about him. When she threw herself
upon the divan and lay resting, he still stared, holding his breath. His
nerves were so on edge