might be in the city.
She stood before a short, narrow mirror that surmounted a shabby
bureau, thinking. Her sister Veronica, with whom she slept, was
already composing herself to dreams. Finally a grim resolution fixed
itself in her consciousness. She would go and see Senator Brander. If
he were in town he would help Bass. Why shouldn't she--he
loved her. He had asked over and over to marry her. Why should she not
go and ask him for help?

She hesitated a little while, then hearing Veronica breathing
regularly, she put on her hat and jacket, and noiselessly opened the
door into the sitting-room to see if any one were stirring.

There was no sound save that of Gerhardt rocking nervously to and
fro in the kitchen. There was no light save that of her own small
room-lamp and a gleam from under the kitchen door. She turned and blew
the former out--then slipped quietly to the front door, opened it
and stepped out into the night.

A waning moon was shining, and a hushed sense of growing life
filled the air, for it was nearing spring again. As Jennie hurried
along the shadowy streets--the arc light had not yet been
invented--she had a sinking sense of fear; what was this rash
thing she was about to do? How would the Senator receive her? What
would he think? She stood stock-still, wavering and doubtful; then the
recollection of Bass in his night cell came over her again, and she
hurried on.

The character of the Capitol Hotel was such that it was not
difficult for a woman to find ingress through the ladies' entrance to
the various floors of the hotel at any hour of the night. The hotel,
not unlike many others of the time, was in no sense loosely conducted,
but its method of supervision in places was lax. Any person could
enter, and, by applying at a rear entrance to the lobby, gain the
attention of the clerk. Otherwise not much notice was taken of those
who came and went.

When she came to the door it was dark save for a low light burning
in the entry-way. The distance to the Senator's room was only a short
way along the hall of the second floor. She hurried up the steps,
nervous and pale, but giving no other outward sign of the storm that
was surging within her. When she came to his familiar door she paused;
she feared that she might not find him in his room; she trembled again
to think that he might be there. A light shone through the transom,
and, summoning all her courage, she knocked. A man coughed and
bestirred hi