Norman seized her arm and hurried through the swiftly moving throng of the under-world--gambling touts, thieves, cut-throats, pick-pockets, opium fiends, drunkards, thugs, carousing miners, and sailors--but above all, everywhere, omnipresent, the abandoned woman--painted, bedizened, lurching through the streets, hanging in doorways, clinging to men on the sidewalks, beckoning from windows, singing vulgar songs on crude platforms among throngs of half-drunken men, whirling past doors and windows in dance-halls, their cracked voices shrill and rasping above the din of cheap music. Elena stopped suddenly and clung heavily to Norman's arm. "Please, Norman, let's go back. I can't endure this." "And you're my chum that never flunked when she gave her word?" he asked with scorn. "We are only a few feet from the hall now." "Where is it?" "Right there in the middle of the block where you see that sign with the blazing red torch." "Come on, then," Elena said, with a shudder. They walked quickly through the long, dimly lighted passage to the entrance of the hall. It was densely packed with a crowd of five hundred. Elena closed her eyes and allowed Norman to lead her through the mob that blocked the space inside the door. At the entrance to the centre aisle he encountered an usher who stared with bulging eyes at his towering figure. Norman leaned close and whispered: "My boy, can you possibly get us two seats?" "Can I git de captain er de football team two seats? Well, des watch me!" The boy darted up the aisle, dived under the platform, drew out two folding-chairs, placed them in the aisle on the front row, darted back, and bowed with grave courtesy. "Dis way, sir!" Norman followed with Elena clinging timidly and blindly to his arm. In a moment they were seated. He offered the boy a dollar. The youngster bowed again. "De honour is all mine, sir. But you can give it to the Cause when they pass the box." Norman turned to Elena. "Well, doesn't that jar you? A sixteen-year-old boy declines a tip, and says give it to the Cause!" The boy darted up the steps of the platform and whispered to the chairman: "Git on to his curves! Dat's de captain o' de football--de bloke dat's worth millions, an' don't give a doggone!" A woman dressed in deep red who sat beside the chairman leaned close and asked with quiet intensity: "You mean young Worth, the millionaire of Nob Hill?" "Bet yer life! Dat's him!" The woman in red whispered to the chairman, who nodded, while his keen gray eyes flashed a ray of light from his heavy brows as he turned toward Norman. The woman wheeled suddenly in her chair, and with her back to the audience bent over a girl who was evidently hiding behind her. "Outdo yourself to-night, Barbara. Young Norman Worth, the son of our multi-millionaire nabob, is sitting in the aisle just in front of you. Win him for the Cause and I'll give you the half of our kingdom." "How can I know him?" the girl asked excitedly.