§ 4
It was a big store which the police had opened up. Inside there were
wounded people lying on the floor, with doctors and others attending
them. Peter was marched down the corridor, and into a room where sat or
stood several other men, more or less in a state of collapse like
himself; people who had failed to satisfy the police, and were being
held under guard.
Peter's two policemen backed him against the wall and
proceeded to go thru his pockets, producing the shameful
contents — a soiled rag, and two cigarette butts picked up on the street,
and a broken pipe, and a watch which had once cost a dollar, but was now
out of order, and too badly damaged to be pawned. That was all they had
any right to find, so far as Peter knew. But there came forth one thing
more — the printed circular which Peter had thrust into his pocket. The
policeman who pulled it out took a glance at it, and then cried, "Good
God!" He stared at Peter, then he stared at the other policeman and
handed him the paper.
At that moment the man not in uniform entered the room. "Mr.
Guffey!" cried the policeman. "See this!" The man took the paper, and
glanced at it, and Peter, watching with bewildered and fascinated eyes,
saw a most terrifying sight. It was as if the man went suddenly out of
his mind. He glared at Peter, and under his black eyebrows the big
staring eyes seemed ready to jump out of his head.
"Aha!" he exclaimed; and then, "So I've got you!" The
hand that held the paper was trembling, and the other hand
reached out like a great claw, and fastened itself in the neck
of Peter's coat, and drew it together until Peter was
squeezed tight. "You threw that bomb!" hissed the man.
"Wh-what?" gasped Peter, his voice almost fainting.
"B-b-bomb?"
"Out with it!" cried the man, and his face came close to Peter's,
his teeth gleaming as if he were going to bite off Peter's nose. "Out
with it! Quick! Who helped you?"
"My G-God!" said Peter. "I d-dunno what you mean."
"You dare lie to me?" roared the man; and he shook
Peter as if he meant to jar his teeth out. "No nonsense
now! Who helped you make that bomb?"
Peter's voice rose to a scream of terror: "I never saw
no bomb! I dunno what you're talkin' about!"
"You, come this way," said the man, and started suddenly toward
the door. It might have been more convenient if he had turned Peter
around, and got him by the back of his coat-collar; but he evidently
held Peter's physical being as a thing too slight for consideration — he
just kept his grip in the bosom of Peter's jacket, and half lifted him
and half shoved him back out of the room, and down a long passage to the
back part of the building. And all the time he was hissing into Peter's
face: "I'll have it out of you! Don't think you can lie to me! Make up
your mind to it, you're going to come thru!"
The man opened a door. It was some kind of storeroom, and he
walked Peter inside and slammed the door behind him. "Now, out with it!"
he said. The man thrust into his pocket the printed circular, or
whatever it was — Peter never saw it again, and never found out what was
printed on it. With his free hand the man grabbed one of Peter's hands,
or rather one finger of Peter's hand, and bent it suddenly backward with
terrible violence. "Oh!" screamed Peter. "Stop!" And then, with a wild
shriek, "You'll break it."
"I mean to break it! mean to break every bone in
your body! I'll tear your finger-nails out; I'll tear the eyes
out of your head, if I have to! You tell me who helped
you make that bomb!"
Peter broke out in a storm of agonized protest; he had
never heard of any bomb, he didn't know what the man
was talking about; he writhed and twisted and doubled
himself over backward, trying to evade the frightful pain
of that pressure on his finger.
"You're lying!" insisted Guffey. "I know you're lying.
You're one of that crowd."
"What crowd? Ouch! I dunno what you mean!"
"You're one of them Reds, aint you?"
"Reds? What are Reds?"
"You want to tell me you don't know what a Red is?
Aint you been giving out them circulars on the street?"
"I never seen the circular!" repeated Peter. "I never
seen a word in it; I dunno what it is."
"You try to stuff me with that?"
"Some woman gimme that circular on the street! Ouch!
Stop! Jesus! I tell you I never looked at the circular!"
"You dare go on lying?" shouted the man, with fresh access of
rage. "And when I seen you with them Reds? I know about your plots, I'm
going to get it out of you." He grabbed Peter's wrist and began to
twist it, and Peter half turned over in the effort to save himself, and
shrieked again, in more piercing tones, "I dunno! I dunno!"
"What's them fellows done for you that you protect them?"
demanded the other. "What good'll it do you if we hang you and let them
escape?"
But Peter only screamed and wept the louder.
"They'll have time to get out of town," persisted the other. "If
you speak quick we can nab them all, and then I'll let you go. You
understand, we won't do a thing to you, if you'll come thru and tell us
who put you up to this. We know it wasn't you that planned it; it's the
big fellows we want."
He began to wheedle and coax Peter; but then, when
Peter answered again with his provoking "I dunno," he
would give another twist to Peter's wrist, and Peter would
yell, almost incoherent with terror and pain — but still declaring
that he could tell nothing, he knew nothing about
any bomb.
So at last Guffey wearied of this futile inquisition; or
perhaps it occurred to him that this was too public a place
for the prosecution of a "third degree" — there might be
some one listening outside the door. He stopped twisting
Peter's wrist, and tilted back Peter's head so that Peter's
frightened eyes were staring into his.
"Now, young fellow," he said, "look here. I got no time for you
just now, but you're going to jail, you're my prisoner, and make up your
mind to it, sooner or later I'm going to get it out of you. It may take
a day, or it may take a month, but you're going to tell me about this
bomb plot, and who printed this here circular opposed to Preparedness,
and all about these Reds you work with. I'm telling you now — so you
think it over; and meantime, you hold your mouth, don't say a word to a
living soul, or if you do I'll tear your tongue out of your throat."
Then, paying no attention to Peter's wailings, he took him by the
back of the collar and marched him down the hall again, and turned him
over to one of the policemen. "Take this man to the city jail," he
said, "and put him in the hole, and keep him there until I come, and
don't let him speak a word to anybody. If he tries it, mash his mouth
for him." So the policeman took poor sobbing Peter by the arm and
marched him out of the building.
