But the kitchen of the Golden Gates as we enter it has one talkative occupant. As soon as our eyes get accustomed to the gloom, which is only relieved by a ray of light filtering through a small, dust-covered window, we notice that a tall woman in faded finery and an astrachan hat, and with some traces of refinement in features and bearing, is standing in the centre and chaffing the others. One or two smile at her jokes, but the majority are wholly indifferent, wearing that air of sullen aloofness which is peculiarly characteristic of a woman's lodging-house. I have not intruded on the privacy of the ladies of the Golden Gates without a show of justification. To enable my companion to make a sketch of the scene, I have resorted to an expedient which permits me to make certain inquiries of a semi-official nature, and to attract the attention of the guests while my _confrère_ is at work. If they were aware that they were being sketched it is quite likely that there would be trouble, and my comrade might find himself in as unpleasant a fix as did a photographer who once went with me to the Chinese quarter in Limehouse, for "Living London," and attempted to take the proprietor of an opium den and some of his clients. The photographer emerged unscathed, but the camera required a considerable amount of repair. Fortunately I have an inquiry to make which puts my audience in sympathy with me, and my _confrère_ is supposed to be making notes of the information supplied as to the last movements of a woman who had used the house for some time and had mysteriously disappeared. During the whole time the lady in the dingy astrachan keeps up a running fire of chaff, which materially assists us. [Illustration: "THE LADY IN THE DINGY ASTRACHAN KEEPS UP A RUNNING FIRE OF CHAFF."] She welcomes us to the "Hotel de Fourpence," and says, though it isn't exactly the Carlton, it is quite comfortable when you get used to it. She interlards her bantering remarks with French words, and we come to the conclusion that she is a governess who has drifted down. It is no uncommon thing to find men and women of education in the lowest lodging-houses of London. I have found a clergyman in one of the worst dens of Flower and Dean Street. In one of the Dale lodging-houses there is a woman whose father had his town house and his country house and his villa in the South of France. This woman in the astrachan hat is a striking contrast to her surroundings. Most of the other inmates are of the usual type--women who have drifted down from honest industry to vagabondage, or have been born to it.