“Sir, if these people are liquor-smugglers, the chances are that they have bribed the police, or have an arrangement with them.”
“That is so. There was a man at the Club the other night who said openly that when he settled here, he asked how he could stock his cellar. They told him that it would be costly, as liquor is against the law, but that he could stock his cellar if he put his order through the chief of police. So he did, and the stuff was delivered. But that was last year, Mr. Harker. They have put in a new Chief of Police since; this Colonel Mackenzie, a Scotch-American: there is no such thing as squaring him.”
“Sir, we shall pass the Club on our way to the Palace of Justice. Might we pass word at both?”
“That is so. Heave round, then, Mr. Harker. Just pass the word to the driver. But kidnapping a woman, Mr. Harker . . . I don’t believe that it could ever be done. I’ve never heard of it’s being done. What would be the object?”
“Partly the woman, sir, and partly (as far as I could gather) to pay off some old score.”
“Well, a man would have to be a pretty thorough-paced scoundrel even to plan a thing like that; but the doing of it is what I don’t see. How would it be done?”
“Sir, they said that Ben Hordano would be there, so I suppose they mean to knock her senseless: give her the knock-out blow on the chin and then lash her up, like a hammock.”
“No, no, Mr. Harker; men are not like that.”
“Sir, Ben Hordano is not a man, but a dangerous animal. The others are the same: they neither think nor act like men.”
“Yes, but, Mr. Harker, a woman is not so easy to attack as a man. You ask one of these big policemen: they would rather tackle three men than one woman. I’ve known it take seven policemen to take one woman to prison: she was a little woman, too; but she kept them guessing and one of them was streaming with blood.”