The evening crowd foregathered. The music became faster, the talk louder, the laughter wilder. At the conclusion of a dance, Kitty saw Malone speak to Zinn, who immediately slipped out the door. The four men at the table, threw down their cards, and sauntered casually from the room and
declining the next dance, the girl dashed up the stairway to her room where she kicked off her high heeled slippers, pulled a pair of heavy woolen stockings over her silk ones, and hurriedly laced her moccasins. She jammed a cap over her ears and slipping into a heavy fur coat, stepped out into the hall and came face to face with Johnnie Claw. "Where do you think you're goin'?" asked the man with a sneer.
"It's none of your business!" snapped the girl, "I don't have to ask you when I want to go anywhere—and I don't have to tell you where I'm goin', either! You haven't got any strings on me!"
"Well—fergit it, 'cause you ain't goin' nowhere's—not right now."
"Get out of my way! Damn you!" cried the girl, "If I had a gun here, I'd blow your rotten heart out!"
"But, you ain't got none—an' I have—so it's the other way around. Only I ain't goin' to kill you, if you do like I say.
"Listen here, I seen you easin' over and tryin' to hear what me an' Malone, an' Zinn was talkin' about. I don't know how much you heard, but you heard enough, so you kep' pretty clost cases on all of us. G'wan back in yer room, 'fore I put you there! What the hell do you care anyhow? All we want is the girl. Onct we git her up in the strong room, you kin have Ace-In-The-Hole. An'
as long as she's around you ain't nowhere with him. Why don't you use yer head?"
"You fool!" screamed the girl, in a sudden fury, and as she tried to spring past him, Claw's fist caught her squarely in the chin and without a sound she crashed backward across the door sill. Swiftly the man reached down and dragged her into the room, removed the key from the lock on the inside, closed and locked the door, and thrusting the key into his pocket, turned and walked down stairs.
How long she lay there, Kitty did not know. Consciousness returned slowly. She was aware of a dull ache in her head, and after what seemed like a long time she struggled to her knees and drew herself onto the bed where she lay trying to think what had happened. Faintly, from below drifted the sound of the piano. So, they were still dancing, down there? Then, suddenly the whole train of events flashed through her brain. She leaped to her feet and staggered groggily to the door. It was locked. In vain she screamed and beat upon the panels. She rushed to the window but its double sash of heavily frosted panes nailed tight for the winter was immovable. In a sudden frenzy of rage she seized a chair and smashed the glass. The inrush of cold air felt good to her throbbing temples, and wrenching a leg from the chair she beat away the jagged fragments until only the frame remained. Leaning far out, she looked down. Her room was at the side of the building, near the rear, and she