Chapter 10
Laura Haynes sat quietly in the third row of the courtroom. Beside her sat the stony-faced Lt. Mason. They had been the main witnesses for the State in the trial. It had been tried in state's court because of the jurisdiction of the State Police and the fact that one of the defendents was an officer of the Sheriff's Department.
She was nervous. It had been an ordeal, reliving those shameful scenes over again in her testimony. And in her heart, she wondered what might happen to her if they were exonerated. She had expressed her fears to Mason, and he had vowed that if they were, they would have to get to her over his dead body. And besides, he had told her, there were Federal charges against Wilkins and Swede Swanson that were still facing them. Seven of the prostitutes had addresses in cities outside the state, and that meant they faced indictments under the Mann Act - transporting females across state borders for immoral purposes - white slavery.
Still, her heart was pounding as the jury filed in and took their selits. They looked grim as the foreman faced the judge. "Have you reached a verdict?" he asked solemnly. The foreman stood. "We have, your honor. We find the defendants guilty on all counts!"
A noisy bustle came over the spectators as newsmen rushed for the door to get to the phones.
"Order!" the judge roared. "Bailiff, lock those doors at once. I'll have order while this court is still in session!" The newsmen submitted meekly, sitting in the last row of seats.
Laura breathed a deep sigh of relief, and Mason grasped her hand and squeezed it reassuringly. She had been on the witness stand for almost two days, and her nerves were about to break. She had refused her doctor's advice not to testify in person but to give depositions, and now she was glad that she had. Her terrifying account of what had happened to her had made in indelible impression on the jurors, she knew... far more than the account of them read by a court clerk or the State's attorney.
The defense attorney had hammered away at her relentlessly, but she felt that his vicious insinuations that she had instigated the brutal sex acts seemed to evoke more sympathy from the jury for her. She was glad it was over.
He had asked her for the tenth time, "Isn't it true that it was you who invited - even solicited releations with Sergeant Sauers ... with Martin "Swede" Swenson ... with all the others?" He also made much of the fact that she used drugs, but the State had proved that she had had only one prescription filled, and that most of that had never been used.
It became obvious that the jury believed her story after Sauers had testified. He came off badly, losing his temper several times, cursing, threatening to get even with the ones who were framing him. In a sense, he convicted himself, for he had no answer to the testimony of the three State Troopers who had found her unconscious with the obscene policeman's club shoved deep inside her vagina. This was rock-hard testimony that could not be denied or explained away.
The defense had tried to shatter her credibility and her character, coming back time and again to the drugs. At one point, she had burst out hysterically that she was in such a nervous state that she would have taken her own life if she hadn't had something to calm her nerves.
The defense attorney made one or two strong points when he had asked repeatedly why, if she was so abhorred by what was taking place, hadn't she called the police. Laura had said, "Because I was afraid for my life. I thought they would kill me if I did. I didn't know where to turn." And in his summation, the States attorney had pointed out again what had happened to Laura when she finally summoned the police.
She looked over at her husband. Bob sat staring at the floor, his head bowed in defeat. She tried to find some remorse in him - some shame... but there was none. He was dejected merely because he'd been caught and charged with conspiracy for his part in setting up the bordello. The court had declared the contract void, returning the motel to Laura, but it didn't matter much now. Her life was empty. Bob would go to prison, along with Wilkins, Swenson and Sauers. She knew that she could never go back to the motel now. There were too many horrible memories. She felt as deserted and alone as at any time in her life. She had been publicly humiliated even though she had been innocent of any wrongdoing of her own choosing. It was a small town where she had grown up, and she had detected the coolness of many former acquaintances already.
She had come to rely on Lt. Harold Mason for advice and concern. He had been like a solid rock, and she had come to have a deep affection for him. She learned why he was nicknamed Happy ... because when he was off duty, he had a carefree, outgoing nature. He was a man who could laugh just over the joy of being alive. He was a good man, she knew, and he had handled almost all the details of the sale of the motel for her.
She had paid the bills and had a tidy sum in the bank. Now she stood on the sidewalk in front of the courthouse. Hap Mason was looking at her, trying to be gay to hide his disappointment that she was leaving.
"I'll be fine, Hap," Laura said. "I'm leaving for Trenton in the morning. My sister lives there. She has room for me until I find out what I want to do. I'll be with people who do love me. I need the time to get this all out of my mind ... to feel better. Then I'll find a job ..." she grinned at him in an impish way, "... maybe even managing a motel."
"If you need me..." Hap Mason put his heart in his warm eyes and leaned over and kissed her awkwardly. "And I don't want to sound foolish, but... well, I know I'm almost twenty years older than you, but... well..." He broke off, blushing.
Give me a little time, Hap," Laura said gently, laying her hand on his cheek, "And it might be sooner than you think" Her eyes were misty and she kissed him quickly and strode away.
That evening, she boarded the train to Trenton. Hap wasn't there. He was on duty. She glowed as she thought of the good man who cared for her... a man whose life was the upholding and enforcing of the law. A man so far removed from Bob that they could be from different worlds. But she needed some time. The scars were deep, she knew, and the nights were still spotted with horrible nightmares that vividly relived every grotesque, degrading moment of the past year or more.
The ordeal of the trial had drained her emotionally, and she felt tired inside and out as she took her seat in the coach. In seven hours, she would be in Trenton with her sister Kim and her husband Marvin. Best of all, she would be with her two nieces, Shelley and little Laura, and she could learn to romp and laugh with them once again.
She drifted off into a "restless sleep within an hour, and her slumber was disturbed by the recurring nightmares. But they were becoming dimmer, and only the more vivid atrocities remained to haunt her now.
Swede fucked her madly, ignoring her cries of pain as his fingers dug into the soft flesh of her buttocks, pulling her high in the air so that his hard, cruel penis could reach the very depths of her vagina. He thrust it in mercilessly, not caring if it hurt her.
Off to the side, Bob stood, sneering at her she held out her hands to him, crying out for help. But in her dream the words wouldn't come. She saw only the contempt for that every eye held as Swede laughed hideously and rammed his turgid cock so deep up into her that it made her gasp and grunt.
She saw another figure standing nearby, ogling the scene with bulging, animal-like orbs. He was pumping on his cock and pointing at her cunt obscenely as peals of laughter rang out across her mind. Strange, she could always hear the laughter but never the words ... not even her own, in her horrible nightmares.
She tried to tell herself that it would stop ... that it was only a bad dream, yet her mind couldn't accept that. The faces kept changing, but the bodies of the men were always the same. They always had out-sized cocks, far too big for her tight pussy and they were always brutes. In their eyes, there was always that hellish look of lust. None of them ever smiled at her or touched her gently. Not even Bob.
She stirred in her sleep as she felt a tender hand on her cheek, and at last she heard the words. "If you need me... " the voice was sayingrShe looked all about her, trying to match the face with the voice, but there was only the lewd, half-mad face of Sauers, the sex-crazed leer of Fish-eyes, the cold eyes of the one called Jukes. She had been only dreaming that she had heard the words, felt the touch of a kind hand on her face... it was all a dream ... a bad dream that gnawed away at her sanity.
"You fucking whore!" She heard no sound coming from Bob, but she could read his lips, feel the utter contempt he felt for her.
"Isn't it true that you've been taking drugs for some time?" Why didn't you call the police?" The words echoed in the corridors of her mind, and always at the end of the dream, one figure would loom larger than all the rest.
He was an ugly giant, ten feet tall, and he was taking off a uniform of some kind with a badge pinned to it. He had a leather belt in his hand, and the hand was raised high! She saw the belt descending to bite at her naked flesh, but she couldn't move. She felt the leather cut into her white skin... saw the blood appear magically in the welt... and she could only stare at the giant ogre with the belt raised on high again.
He put the belt down and picked up a huge club that looked like a baseball bat. He was advancing on her, and she could only lie there, unable to close her pussy-lips against the monstrous wooden club! Then the screams poured from her throat as the agonizing object was shoved deep into her cunt!
A hand was shaking Laura's shoulder gently, and a kind voice was asking, "Can I help you, lady? Shall I have the conductor stop the train?"
Laura sat up straight, rubbing her eyes. She looked at the concerned face of the elderly man who had taken the seat next to her. "Thank God!" she said fervently. He smiled in relief.
"That was a pretty bad nightmare you were having," he consoled her. "Are you all right now?"
Laura nodded gratefully. "Yes, and thank you for waking me. It was a bad dream .. .a terribly real nightmare." She stared straight ahead for a moment, fear flitting across her face.
"A nightmare I won't ever have to live through again."