There are rich men in this city who make
it their diversion to answer advertisements and decoy young girls. A
stenographer in my office told me that she had had over twenty
positions in one year, and that she had left every one because some
man in the office had approached her."
He paused for a moment. "You see," he added, "I have been finding
out these things. You thought I was unreasonable, but I know what
your dangers are. You are a stranger here; you have no friends and
no influence, and so you will always be the one to suffer. I don't
mean merely in a case like this, where it comes to the police and
the newspapers; I mean in social matters--where it is a question of
your reputation, of the interpretation which people will place upon
your actions. They have their wealth and their prestige and their
privileges, and they stand at bay. They are perfectly willing to
give a stranger a good time, if the stranger has a pretty face and a
lively wit to entertain them; but when you come to trespass, or to
threaten their power, then you find out how they can hate you, and
how mercilessly they will slander and ruin you!"
CHAPTER VI
Lucy's adventure had so taken up the attention of them both that
they had forgotten all about the matter of the stock.
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