Miss Callaghan Comes To Grief

Raven finished his drink and stood up. “Tomorrow you guys beat up the bookers and take them along to Franky's. We'll have a general meeting and then I'll explain to the girls what's comin' to them. Get some of the boys. I want the tough ones. Tell 'em to bring clubs. We might have a little trouble with some of those dames.”

The three nodded and left him.

Raven wandered up and down the room, thinking. He knew he would have to play his game very carefully.

It was worth the risks. If he slipped up on the Mann Act he was sunk.

He tossed his cigarette away and went into the bathroom to wash his hands. He didn't feel like sleep. His brain was too active. Quietly he crossed the room and opened the door of the spare bedroom. His hand reached out and groped for the light switch.

Sadie said out of the darkness, “Who is it?” Her voice sounded husky with fear.

Raven turned on the light.

She sat up, holding the sheet close to her chin. Her eyes looked very dark and big and her face was the colour of chalk.

Raven came and leant over the bedrail. “I want to talk to you,” he said quietly.

There was a long pause, then he went on, “How long have you been hustlin'?”

She didn't say anything.

He came round and sat on the bed. “If you don't answer my questions I'll hurt you,” he said. “How long?”

She looked at the thin face, the cold, merciless eyes and the paper−thin lips. She said, “I was forced into this two months ago.”

“Why?”

“I don't know.”

“Why didn't Carrie want me to see you?”

“I don't know.”

Raven said, “Get out of bed and take that thing off.”

Sadie shook her head wildly. “No...” she said, clinging to the sheet. “Leave me alone.”

“Do it,” Raven said.

“No. You're not touchin' me. I'll screamI'll scream....”

Raven hit her on the side of her jaw very hard. Her head snapped back and she went limp, falling against the top of the bed with a little thud.

He got off the bed, went into the other room and found some cord. He came back again, stripped off the sheet, turned her over on her face and tied her hands behind her. He turned her again and gagged her with her stockings that hung over the bedrail. Then he fastened her ankles securely to each of the bedposts. By the time he had finished she had recovered from the blow. Her eyes pleaded, but he didn't look at her.

He went out and came back after a few minutes with a small bottle containing some colourless fluid. He sat down beside her on the bed. “After tonight you'll do anything that I tell you without hesitation. I ain't got time to persuade you. I like a dame to obey. You'll obey after this.”

He took the cork out of the bottle and, bending over her shrinking body, poured the fluid on to her nightdress, low down.

She jerked as the cold fluid ran down her body. A strong smell of turpentine filled the room. Raven got up and replaced the cork. “It'll take a couple of weeks to get over this,” he said with a little grin. “But I can wait.

I shan't have to do it again.”

She lay very still, a puzzled look in her eyes. She couldn't understand why he had done this. She felt nothing, only the cold wetness on her skin. She could understand pain, she could understand beating, but this defeated her.

He made sure that her bonds were tight, testing the knots carefully. He adjusted the gag and then he straightened.

The puzzled look in her eyes suddenly gave way to fear. The fluid began to penetrate. She twisted this way and that as the horrible burning sensation began to grow.

Raven nodded. “I'll see you in the morning,” he said, turning out the light, and went away, leaving her writhing in the heavy darkness.

5

September 7th, 2.20 p.m.

WHEN Special Prosecutor Dewey said, “Don't you remember any testimony about Hines and the poultry racket there by him?” Jay Ellinger dropped his pencil and sat back with a gasp.

Hines's defender, Stryker, was already on his feet, shouting, “I demand a mistrial. Your Honour! Your Honour! I demand a mistrial!”

Ellinger whispered to the Tribune reporter, “It's over. They've been waitin' for a loophole like this.”

The Tribune reporter shook his head. “Naw,” he said, “they'll go on. This goddamn' trial will last for years.”

But Ellinger knew in his bones that Dewey had made just that one little slip that would give the Judge the chance of getting Hines freed. Although the trial dragged on over the week−end, by Monday everyone knew that Dewey's tremendous work of bringing Hines to trial had to be started all over again.

Ellinger got his copy off and then immediately caught a train back to East St. Louis. He was determined to resign before he could be sent on some other job that would keep him from the work he had been impatiently waiting to tackle.

Since he had been away he hadn't heard one word from Benny. He had been so busy attending the Hines trial that he had not been able to check up with the home town news. Now, as he stepped out of the train, he could hardly contain his patience to get started.