Janet’s appearance in her Spanish robes with the genuine Castilian mantilla, the high tortoise shell comb, and the silk Andalusian shawl flaming brilliantly against her dark hair, was one of the sensations of the evening. Robert’s somber monk’s cowl at her side subtracted nothing from this sensation. He conducted her through the mazes of the upper dancing floor and then brought her back to the gorgeous gypsy tent that had been set up on the floor below. There she began to play the gypsy fortune teller with as much subtlety as the professional exertions of the musical Roughnecks permitted. Robert stood near the tent as a sort of self-constituted watchman and bodyguard extraordinary. As John Barleycorn was being liberally dispensed in the refreshment room, a number of tipsy masqueraders soon turned up, and some of these roistered into Janet’s tent despite Robert’s efforts to fend them off. Hutchins Burley was among those who presently appeared on the scene. It was after Mazie Ross had repeatedly toyed with his erotic instincts and incited his hot pursuit only to defeat him at a point just short of possession. In a fury of frustration, he had descended to the first floor to inflame his passions further at the public bar. Thus inspirited, he propelled his Falstaffian proportions into the gypsy tent and requested Janet to read his palm. His breath alone would have decided Janet to refuse. But when he interrupted her first sentence by tearing off her mask and importuning a closer acquaintance with the face behind it, she pushed abruptly past him and, running outside the tent, waited for him to leave it. With surprising alacrity Hutchins Burley bundled after her. "You’re a lively little kipper," he shouted, filled with liquor and desire. And he wildly reached out one arm to clasp her around the waist. But Janet, uttering a low cry, dodged and slipped past him, while Burley’s flopping arms were caught firmly by two men who had sprung forward for this purpose. One of these was Robert. The other was a tall, unobtrusive man who had quietly but deftly detached himself from the throng. The attention of several people had been arrested by Janet’s cry and flight, and these now pressed forward to learn what the trouble was. A confusion of queries, blusterings and exclamations followed, during which the Roughnecks struck up the "Nobody Home" rag. Hutchins Burley had recovered some of his wits under the compulsion of several menacing faces around him. Seeing him become tractable, Robert contemptuously flung off the arm he held and walked away towards Janet. Burley followed his receding steps with a malevolent glare, and then turned savagely on the tall quiet stranger who was still holding his other arm in a grip of steel. "Leggo my arm," he bellowed. "A word in your ear, Mr. Burley," said the quiet one, relaxing his grip. "Plain clothes men are in the crowd. If you kick up a shindy, you’ll be giving them what they’re looking for."