Chapter 2
Barbara Ames had begun that day in anger. She had fallen into various moods of resentment and frustration during the day and had finally lapsed into weary resignation.
They'd had no right to imprison her here in the first place. That was what it amounted to. But after they had done so, she was certainly entitled to a minimum of comfort. They could easily had moved her to another hotel.
Her major resentment, however, was against being a helpless pawn in a struggle she didn't know anything about and had had no part in; the rivalry between Vince Kane and Arthur--"Call me Art"--Ringler, the local political power. Power struggles such as theirs interested her not at all. She was a dancer, and as such she had a right to earn her living in the chorus line at the Star Dust Club. That didn't make her a tramp or a tart or anything other than an honest performer trying to work her way up to a solo spot.
So Vince Kane owned the Star Dust Club. So it was his headquarters. Barbara couldn't have cared less. Nor was it her fault that she happened to be coming out of the dressing room when a black-suited man with a gun in his hand rushed out of Vince Kane's office and headed for the alley exit door.
But that was how it had happened.
She hadn't even heard the shot. That made the funny-looking extension on the end of the gun very unlucky for her, they said, because it was a silencer. If the gun hadn't been silenced there would have been the sound of a shot, and that would have brought other witnesses.
Of course there had been one bit of luck. The shot that the fleeing gunman had turned and snapped in her direction had missed her. But maybe that really hadn't been lucky either. If it had hit her just a little bit-then she probably wouldn't have blundered into Vince Kane's office to see him lying there writhing on the floor. She would probably have run away herself so that no one would have known she'd been the sole witness to the attempted murder.
Vince Kane, even with blood running out of his shoulder, had tried to send her away.
"Beat it!" he yelled at her. "Go mix with the chorus and forget this."
But not little Barbara! She had to be a heroine. She couldn't leave a man dying on the floor.
Of course Vince hadn't been dying. He wasn't even seriously wounded, but Barbara didn't know that at the time. She'd taken his order to leave as terror-stricken delirium, so limited was her experience in this sort of thing. She'd dropped to her knees beside him and tried to pull his head into her lap while she ignored his curses, his pleas to go somewhere and get lost. She'd screamed for help at the top of her lungs; screams that were heard by Lieutenant Egan of the vice squad, who just happened to be out front at the time.
And Barbara didn't see how she could be blamed for giving Egan all of it right off the bat. She hadn't been briefed. She didn't know Kane preferred to settle his own troubles. So far as Barbara was concerned, somebody had shot the boss and was getting away and Lieutenant Egan was the man to tell about it.
Lying there on the sweat-damp bed in the stuffy room they'd given her in the Park Hotel, Barbara pondered the mysteries of being a material witness. It meant they could lock you up. It also meant because there was a big feud going on between Ringler and Kane that they could practically kidnap you and hide you out incognito in order to keep the opposition's lawyers from getting at you.
That wasn't the way it had been put. Barbara was supposed to be under protection from the gunman's friends. Actually, the district attorney, under orders from Boss Ringler, was hiding her from Kane. Ringler, trying to break Kane's power, needed Barbara's testimony or would need it when the trial came up in order to do something to Kane. Exactly what this something was, Barbara didn't know.
She only knew that she'd been cut off from the world in this crazy hotel room where there wasn't even an air-conditioner, and she was getting pretty sick of it. There was a phony name on the register and her meals were brought to the door, which was locked from the outside. Otherwise she'd been pretty much ignored.
Endless hours in all this heat. What a nightmare. Barbara, these injustices going around and around in her mind, hadn't been able to get any real sleep. She was dozing now, the hot, stale air heavy in her lungs, dozing and thinking that a girl alone in a city without any close friends could get into positions of great disadvantage.
And she was afraid. But she didn't quite know what she was afraid of. She'd committed no crime, and she couldn't conceive of a sinister gunman stalking her in order to silence her tongue. That was too ridiculous.
But she was confused and bewildered; and so, while things stayed as they were, she'd found the easiest course was to lie there and suffer, to wait and see what was going to happen, to lie there and hope to heaven the heat broke.
That was the situation when she was suddenly hurled into a nightmare.
It began with a sound at the window and then a hand clapped cruelly over her mouth. Then her head was twisted to the side, and there seemed to be an attempt to smother her with the pillow she'd been resting on.
She began to fight but the weight of bodies there were at least two of them was upon her. Strong arms held her helpless. She squirmed and fought, trying to bite the hand that gagged her so she could scream. It was useless.
Then something was jerked over her head like a sack; the pillowcase from the other pillow, she realized vaguely. They were using it as a blindfold.
Now pure terror ripped at her mind. Had the gunman's friend's found her? Was she going to be murdered?
Then her mouth was jerked open and part of the pillow case was pushed into it, jammed in tight by a finger that kepi shoving it in until her mouth was full of it. Then the rest of the pillow case was wrapped around her head, leaving hardly enough room to breathe. She got her hands loose and struck out, trying to hit one of them, but they put a stop to that in a hurry by taking something else, probably a necktie, and binding her wrists together behind her back.
With all this done, they let up. The pressure on her released, Barbara tried to rise from the bed. But she was slammed back hard twice after which she lay there, whimpering into her gag, hoping to God she wasn't going to be killed.
She had only her ears to tell her what was going on now, but she couldn't hear too well because of the pillow case wrapped around them. But she was able to hear somebody coming in the window and thought there were at least three of them no, four. She was sure there were four because two had been manhandling her in the beginning and then, when they got her tied up like an animal, she heard two more come in the window.
God, she moaned soundlessly. Did it take four men to kill one helpless, naked girl? But maybe they didn't intend to kill her. Maybe they planned to do something else.
This fear dawned as a certainty when she felt her ankles gripped from both sides and fought against the pressure that pulled her legs apart. She kicked and fought desperately, but she might as well have saved her strength. They had her. They had her good. There was nothing she could do but he there and take it.
She waited, the tendons at her thighs hurting from the strain put on them. Then her whole body jerked in outrage at what one of them did next. There was low laughter at her unconscious reaction.
The animals! The dirty, filthy degenerates! Doing a thing like that to a girl. If they were going to rape her, okay. There was nothing she could do about it. And if they weren't brutal it would work out all right. She was a fairly big girl nothing fragile about her, and taking on four rapists wouldn't kill her. It could wear her down plenty, but it wouldn't kill her as long as they played fair.
But doing that to a girl! What the louse was doing! Only a degenerate would think of it. They had her down, and if they wanted to take her like men, let them go ahead. But God! To have to lie there and-
Barbara tried to sit up. She was knocked back down again. She twisted, her body arced over her bound wrists and her belly tightened and heaved in reaction to the abuse that one of her invisible tormentors had devised. There was muffled laughter, snickering, in the room hidden demons out of hell amusing themselves by watching her struggles.
She fought against the shame and embarrassment of the spectacle she must had presented. Fought it because it didn't make any difference. Why should she feel ashamed in front of animals like these?
But Barbara's tormentor knew what he was doing. He was good. He'd had practice. He had evidently paid some hustler to hold still for him at some time.
Oh God! He brought her to the goal of the manipulation swiftly, and she fought the impulse to come up and meet him there on the crest of it; fought hard; but her body responded automatically and there was enough cooperation on her part to make the snickering come louder.
He stopped and Barbara collapsed, cursing them against the gag that filled her mouth.
She was no longer afraid, now. The fear had been engulfed by the rage that this indignity generated within her. The hell with them. If they were going to kill her, okay. Why didn't they go ahead with it?
With hardly any rest after the devilish attack, she was suddenly pulled to her feet. She was weak from her normal, healthy body pouring its strength into the forced delight of what had occurred, and this was reflected in the reeling, almost drunken manner in which she staggered across the room.
They were laughing. They were having a hell of a time. They were here and there and everywhere in this new game of blind man's buff. They kept steering her erratically around the room getting great pleasure from her naked clumsiness.
Then one of them applied a more vicious form of amusement. A quick, accurate thrust, and her surprised body arced forward, her trapped hands clawed downward in desperation as her now free legs lunged forward trying to escape. But he followed her followed there behind her while they laughed.
Then she heard the first clear words any of them had uttered; a muffled, jeering voice:
"Wow. She climbed right up the damn wall ... "
They hauled her back to the bed now and it took a new turn. The business. The real thing. They'd had their fun, and now they were taking what they came after.
The first one was heavy and his breath was in her face. After he abused her he cursed her through the pillow case because it was over so quickly. As if that had been her fault.
The second was different. Her gagged mouth was pushed into the pillow this time with hard hands gripping her ankles to keep her from blocking him. He rolled off with a gasp of exhaustion.
The third she was hardly conscious of. They'd pulled her back down the bed her head had banged against the wall while the second one took her and left her on her belly while the third one got his kicks.
Then she was turned over, and it was as though a wet, stinking mountain had been laid on top of her. She could smell the stink of his body and the rottenness of his breath. She heard the laughter of the others while this fourth rapist made himself one with her.
And it was over.
God! It was over and she was still alive.
No, not quite over. One of the earlier ones had gotten his vitality back and had a new idea. She was hurled viciously over on her belly again. This time they had to hold her, and it took all three of them to do it. She screamed soundlessly into the gag while this final indignity was perpetrated on her body. Before it was over, she was chewing in panic on the gag; slavering into it as she went through this new, specialized form of hell.
When it was over, she lay still, whimpering in her throat. Would they stop now? Would they please stop now? Had she not furnished them with enough pleasure and amusement? Had she not been a good girl and submitted meekly to all their demands?
Thus did she reflect a temporarily broken spirit as she prayed that it had really ended.
And it had. They'd gotten what they'd come for, gotten it in full, delightful measure and now it was time to go. And, in weird contrast, they turned human enough to show her a little consideration. They did not leave her gagged and helpless. The last one to leave freed her wrists so that she could remove the pillowcase gag herself.
She did not move. She remained where she was, motionless, in that last, lewd position, her arms still crossed over her back, for what seemed an age. Then she fell sideways, off her knees and face which had been the two points of contact of her previous position. She pulled her knees higher, hard against her breasts, and sobbed in defeat as she pawed at the pillowcase.
But there was sudden, renewed activity in the room. The door had opened, and Barbara cringed, awaiting a new attack; for a continuation of the abuse she'd grown almost used to. But then fumbling hands untied the pillowcase and pulled the gag from her mouth.
"Barbara-baby! For God's sake! What happened?"
It was Barney Williams from the club. There were two other men with him, but they were only faces in the background as Barbara reached for Barney and he took her in his arms. She knew him only casually as Vince Kane's right-hand man, but now he was an angel of salvation.
He'd steadied sharply since his first outburst. His eyes were cold and hard as he held her, raising one hand to motion toward the window. The two men came out of their trance and vanished through the window into the warehouse.
"What happened, Barbara?"
"I was dozing. They grabbed me." She opened her eyes. "What are you doing here?"
"I've been hunting for you. I got a lead half an hour ago."
"I'm so glad. It was horrible."
"I've got a writ. I'm taking you out of here."
Back on Archer Street, the four rapists showed native caution by going behind the tavern to relive their experience.
"God!" Gooch said. "I feel like I come out of a hot shower. The sweat's running down my legs."
"What a night to have a broad," Frenchy chuckled.
"It was worth it, though," Lew wheezed. The sweat poured off his face, and his lungs pumped like bellows. His eyes glowed in the light of the match he held to a cigarette.
"Me," Gooch laughed, "I was so damned sweaty I almost slid off the broad."
"You were pretty close from what I could see," Frenchy smirked.
Gooch laughed as he looked at Frenchy. "That idea you got at first while we held her down. She liked it. You could see she liked it."
Lew's fat jowls quivered. "And when she went into her dance. I thought she was gonna go right up through the ceiling."
Sammy laughed. "Her legs working against nothing nothing at all. like going up a ladder with no ladder there."
"There was something there," Frenchy murmured. "There was something there all right."
"I wish I'd had me a camera," Gooch said. "A picture of how she was righl: at the top would sell for ten bucks."
"Who do you suppose the broad was?" Sammy asked.
Frenchy shrugged. "She was all right, I'll say that for her. A lot of spirit, till it finally broke."
"It didn't break. She fought right up to the end."
"Oh, no," Frenchy said softly. "It broke. I broke it."
"I never saw that before," Gooch said. "It must have hurt her like hell."
"She'll always remember."
"They say some broads like it," Lew observed. "Maybe," Gooch said doubtfully, "but it must be hell getting used to Frenchy's way."
They envied him for getting more out of the adventure than they had.
"Think she'll get out of that room now?" Sammy asked.
Frenchy laughed. "She'll go out of there like a shot. I'll bet she yelped as she ran down the hall."
"It would be great if she'd stay around a week or so."
"Forget it," Frenchy said sharply. "It's always the second trip that gets a guy into trouble. You got something for free. Now forget it."
Lew yawned. "I'm beat. I'm going home and sack out, you guys."
"I could use a little myself," Gooch said.
Gooch and Lew paired off and moved lazily up the alley. Sammy stirred restlessly. "What you gonna do, Frenchy?"
"I think I'll go over to the park and find some grass. It's too damned hot to go inside."
"Me too. I'll go with you."
"Won't your old lady holler?"
"The devil with her," Sammy said contemptuously. "She can have that stinking room. All she does is snore anyhow."
Frenchy sighed and yawned. They moved lazily up to Lincoln Street and then went daringly past the hotel in which they'd just finished committing rape and violence. They grinned at each other.
"Want to go in and ask if they got any natural blondes?" Sammy asked.
Frenchy laughed. "Natural blondes? You can't hardly find that kind any more."
Sammy laughed also. "But when you do, you really got yourself something."
They walked on past the Park Hotel and were soon stretched on the comparatively tool grass in Belmore Park, the shabby little oasis that broke the monotony of brick and cement on the lower east side.
Frenchy sighed. "I feel good. I feel damned good."
"Me too," Sammy said.
Soon they were asleep, unaware that their lives had reached a turning point; unaware that on this hottest night of the year they had opened a terrible Pandora's box and the furies were already pouring out...