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"It is a select neighborhood, Mr. Kent. The heart of the most refined geisha quarter, hidden, so discreetly, don't you think, behind our respectability, yours and mine. There, you see, is the Akebono machiai, one of the most famous waiting houses, where you may feast with geisha." He pointed across one of the alleys where the shojis had been drawn aside, the wide window opening displaying a large, immaculately clean room, furnished with the constraint usual in Japan, with only a low table and some silk cushions, a kakemono, hanging silk scroll picture, in the tokonoma recess. "A very quiet place usually in the day," he explained. "But at night, ah, what scenes of revelry, with happy guests disporting themselves with sake wine and the pretty geisha." He sighed and threw wide his arms, as would he, ravished, press to his breast one of the beauties of his imagination. "You shall see, Mr. Kent, even here," now he was pointing through the window in the other wall to a smaller house. The closed, opaque paper shoji, bamboo barred, were almost within arm's length. From beyond it came the strident whimper of samisen strings. "That is O-Toshi-san," he explained confidentially, impressively, "the famous O-Toshi-san. You shall see her often, there in her window; but, Mr. Kent, do not lose your heart there. No, don't," he became even more confidential, suggestively smiling. "She belongs to Mr. Kato, the police commissioner. He paid big makura-kin, pillow-money, oh, so big, I hear——"