The Purple Lady

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• 1916
• 0 hr 50 mins
• Comedy

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The Uplift Society, with Silas Gilworthy at its head, plans to rid the city of the pernicious influence of the dance parlors. The worst of these is said to be the Purple Lightning Tango Parlor, so-called because of its peculiar light effect. Here the famous dancer, Fifi Melotte, is the star entertainer and leading spirit. Detective Rogers, a friend of Gilworthy's, offers to show him the place and its iniquities, so thinking to aid "the cause," he goes. However, he is an easy victim to Fifi's innocent ways, assumed for the moment, and comes more than once to see her, without the escort of the Uplift Society. The tango parlor is raided, and Fifi and "Uncle Silas," with difficulty, escape a visit to the police court. They "do" Coney Island and have their pictures taken together m a loving pose. Silas is engaged to the wealthy Adelaide Severn, and their marriage is soon to take place. Adelaide is being besieged by the attentions of a bogus Count, who is a friend of Fifi's. The Count has stolen a necklace of matched Pearls and given them to Fifi for safekeeping. Fifi in turn has slipped the mesh bag in which she has placed them in Silas' desk and ask for an explanation. Not knowing what else to do, he tells his fiancée it is his wedding present to her. Fifi comes to the Severn home, where the wedding is to take place, to demand the return of the bag and blackmail him with the loving picture. Silas introduces her as Mrs. Rogers, the wife of his detective friend who has written she cannot come. But complications follow immediately, when Rogers himself arrives on the trail of the Count, whom he suspects of having the necklace, soon followed by Mrs. Rogers. The necklace is stolen from Adelaide's neck, and the person nearest her, whom Rogers has to lock up for safe-keeping, is his own wife. Both Rogers and Silas go to Fifi's room in search of the pearls. Fifi screams, the entire household enters, and Rogers and Silas make a hasty exit. Silas tries to hide in a kimono in the closet, and is discovered. But the pearls are in the hem of the kimono, and the Count tries to snatch it after Silas has taken it off. Rogers arrests the Count, confiscates the pearls in the name of the government, and Adelaide and Silas, forgiving and forgetting, prepare to keep step to the wedding march.