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have one. I can get that for you without anybody's knowing anything about your connection with
the case. We can say it's for a girl from New York. But you'll have to go in in the presence of my
men. They won't permit any trouble. You can get your daughter all right--we'll bring her away,
and him, too, if you say so; but you'll have to make some charge against him, if we do. Then
there's the danger of the neighbors seeing. You can't always guarantee you won't collect a
crowd that way." Butler had many misgivings about the matter. It was fraught with great danger
of publicity. Still he wanted to know. He wanted to terrify Aileen if he could--to reform her
drastically.
Within a week Alderson learned that Aileen and Cowperwood were visiting an apparently private
residence, which was anything but that. The house on South Sixth Street was one of
assignation purely; but in its way it was superior to the average establishment of its
kind--of red brick, white-stone trimmings, four stories high, and all the rooms, some eighteen in
number, furnished in a showy but cleanly way. It's patronage was highly exclusive, only those
being admitted who were known to the mistress, having been introduced by others. This
guaranteed that privacy which the illicit affairs of this world so greatly required. The mere
phrase, "I have an appointment," was sufficient, where either of the parties was known, to cause
them to be shown to a private suite. Cowperwood had known of the place from previous
experiences, and when it became necessary to abandon the North Tenth Street house, he had
directed Aileen to meet him here.
The matter of entering a place of this kind and trying to find any one was, as Alderson informed
Butler on hearing of its character, exceedingly difficult. It involved the right of search, which was
difficult to get. To enter by sheer force was easy enough in most instances where the business
conducted was in contradistinction to the moral sentiment of the community; but sometimes one
encountered violent opposition from the tenants themselves. It might be so in this case. The
only sure way of avoiding such opposition would be to take the woman who ran the place into
one's confidence, and by paying her sufficiently insure silence. "But I do not advise that in this
instance," Alderson had told Butler, "for I believe this woman is particularly friendly to your man.
It might be better, in spite of the risk, to take it by surprise." To do that, he explained, it would be
necessary to have at least three men in addition to the leader--perhaps four, who, once one
man had been able to make his entrance into the hallway, on the door being opened in
response to a ring, would appear quickly and enter with and sustain him. Quickness of search
was the next thing-- the prompt opening of all doors. The servants, if any, would have to be
overpowered and silenced in some way. Money sometimes did this; force accomplished it at
other times. Then one of the detectives simulating a servant could tap gently at the different
doors--Butler and the others standing by--and in case a face appeared identify it or not, as the
case might be. If the door was not opened and the room was not empty, it could eventually be
forced. The house was one of a solid block, so that there was no chance of escape save by the
front and rear doors, which were to be safe-guarded. It was a daringly conceived scheme. In
spite of all this, secrecy in the matter of removing Aileen was to be preserved.
When Butler heard of this he was nervous about the whole terrible procedure. He thought once
that without going to the house he would merely talk to his daughter declaring that he knew and
that she could not possibly deny it. He would then give her her choice between going to Europe
or going to a reformatory. But a sense of the raw brutality of Aileen's disposition, and something
essentially coarse in himself, made him eventually adopt the other method. He ordered
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