Queen Beelzebub cast an admiring look in his direction and began to speak in a quiet lady-like manner, as though she were presiding at a tea-table, and the subject of conversation was quite an ordinary one. "I was left an orphan at an early age," she said leisurely, "poor and honest and friendless. For years I led what you fools call a decent life, earning my bread by going out as a governess. But poverty and honesty did not please me, especially since the first was the outcome of the last. I never wished to marry, as I did not care for men. I did not wish for society, or fame, or flirtation, or, indeed, anything a woman usually longs for. I desired power!" and as she uttered the last word an infernal expression of pride came over her white and delicate face. "Power for a bad purpose?" "Well, you see, Mr. Halliday, I could not get power for a good one. The sole way in which I could obtain my ends was to appeal to people's self-love. I read of those Italian societies, and the way in which they terrorized the world. Whatever the members of those societies want they get, because they work by blackmail, by threats, by the knife, and with poison. I always wished to found a society of that sort, but I noticed how frequently things went wrong because the members of various societies got mixed up with women, or drank too much, or gave themselves away in a moment of profligacy." "Ah," Dan smoked calmly, "now I understand why your rules were so stringent." "You speak of them in a past tense," said Miss Armour curiously. "Well," Dan pressed down the tobacco in his pipe, "the society is done for; it's gastados, used up, busted, and all the rest of it. Well?" "Well," echoed the woman, passing over his remark with a sneer. "I wished to collect a body of men and women who were to live like saints and use all the power such self-denial gave them to gain all they wanted for themselves." "A devilishly clever scheme." "But not original, like my tortures," Queen Beelzebub assured him. "In Australia--Sydney, New South Wales--I fancy there are societies who have the same rules. They call such an organization there a 'Push!' I think." Dan nodded. "I have heard of such things." "Well, then--to make a long story short, as I want to go to bed, and can't enjoy your delightful society much longer--I intended to work on those lines. Years and years ago Mrs. Jarsell was a favorite pupil of mine. We parted and she married a man with money. He died," Miss Armour laughed, "in fact, since he treated Eliza badly, I got rid of him." "Oh, so that is the hold you have on her."