Week 6

[MARGARET]: A fool would have been able to tell something wasn't right from a mile away. A girl, aged no more than twenty, creeping through the night with a little boy in hand, constantly peering over her shoulder? I just knew from her disposition that something was awry.

[DETECTIVE]: Around what time did you witness the aforementioned incident?

[M]: Why, I was just returning to my carriage from a theatre performance downtown. I'd reckon it was nearly midnight by the time that I saw the pair slinking through the cobblestones.

[D]: Could you describe both the boy and the young woman's actions a bit more to me, ma'am, and the events that led you to follow them?

[M]: Yes. The girl was tall and had hair like straw. She was plain and had large, nervous eyes that darted back and forth in her skull as if she were nervous, like a bird or something. She carried a bundle in one arm and the hand of the boy in the other, and she kept glancing down at her stomach and her hands and all around, a bit crazy like. The boy was no older than seven or eight, and he was all tucked up in his Sunday best. He was muttering to himself and dragging the girl toward a toy train in one of the shop windows when I decided to follow along to see where they were going. Curiosity got the best of me.

[D]: And where did they go?

[M]: I followed them up to the pharmacy, which was obviously closed as it was the middle of the night. I peered from behind the brick wall at the corner, and watched the boy sit on the sidewalk and the girl creep inside after checking behind her.

[D]: And then what happened?

[M]: I waited for a moment, and decided to investigate further. I know I should have called a professional, but I just couldn't imagine letting something happen where I could intervene---

[D]: Just the facts please, ma'am. We'll hear the rest of your testimony later. Right now we're focused on gathering evidence.

[M]: Of course, I -- I understand. Well, after that I crept up to the glass siding and got down real low and peered from behind the scales. The girl wearily approached the counter and a man whom I've never seen offer medicine sauntered out from the backroom which was lit by a single candle. He proffered a small, black box, and after a brief bit of conversation, took the girl into the back with him. [looking away, a tear welling in her eyes] And that's when I heard her scream.

[D]: About how long would you say was the period between the girl being taken behind the counter and her yell, ma'am.

[M]: Oh my, I, I couldn't say. It was all happening so fast, uh, maybe thirty or forty seconds? A minute perhaps, but certainly not more.

[D]: And what was the content of this scream?

[M]: It was muffled and brief, but resoundingly clear. I had heard a scream like that once in my life. The kind of ear-splitting shriek of someone agonizing but not being able to express it fully. It was a shriek between life and death and neither. And my body just turned to ice.

[D]: Could you outline the final events that you witnessed? [making several circles on his notebook] 

[M]: Why, yes. I kept crouching and waiting for the girl to return, but for what seemed like hours on end she didn't. Why, even a cow came to the square and mawed at the boy before she resurfaced. And when she did come, her hair was a mess, and she had lost her bundle that she entered with. She walked briskly out, murmuring to herself and dragging the little boy with only her black box in her hands.

[D]: Do you have any other information you feel might be pertinent in this report, ma'am?

[M]: Hm...Just that my niece, Simone, told me of this place and the horrors that go on here. I don't mean to make this issue out to be more than it is, but with the alcohol and the vice, the sexual perversion and the prostitution, not to mention the --

[D]: Any final details of the case, ma'am?

[M]: Well no, I suppose thats all I saw. Them walking along their way, quickly, just as they had come. You can never know, it begins younger and younger in this godforesaken country...