nine in
the evening
Well , then ! there are streets , or ends of streets , there are houses , unknown for the most part to persons of social distinction , to which a woman of that class can not go without causing cruel and very wounding things to be thought of her . Whether the woman be rich and has a carriage , whether she is on foot , or is disguised , if she enters one of these Parisian defiles at any hour of the day , she compromises her reputation as a virtuous woman . If , by chance , she is there at nine in the evening the conjectures that an observer permits himself to make upon her may prove fearful in their consequences . But if the woman is young and pretty , if she enters a house in one of those streets , if the house has a long , dark , damp , and evil-smelling passage-way , at the end of which flickers the pallid gleam of an oil lamp , and if beneath that gleam appears the horrid face of a withered old woman with fleshless fingers , ah , then ! and we say it in the interests of young and pretty women , that woman is lost . She is at the mercy of the first man of her acquaintance who sees her in that Parisian slough .