t wild; an Irish peasant girl,
aged twenty.] No! No! Let me go!

[Rushes into the opposite corner, and cowers in terror.]

JULIA. [Following her.] Annie! Annie!

ANNIE. [Flings her off, and stretches out her arms.] What do you want
with me? Help! Help! I won't do it! I won't stay! Let me alone!

[Wild and frantic sobbing.]

JULIA. Annie, dear! Annie! Look at me! Don't you know me? I'm Julia!
Your own Julia! No one shall hurt you... no one!

ANNIE. [Stares at her wildly.] He's after me still! He'll follow me
here! He won't let me get away from him! Oh, save me!

JULIA. [Embracing her.] Listen to me, dear. Don't think of things like
that. You are in my home... nothing can hurt you. Don't let these evil
dreams take hold of you.

ANNIE. [Stares, as if coming out of a trance.] Why didn't you help me
before?

JULIA. Come, dear... come.

ANNIE. It's too late... too late! Oh... I can't forget about it!

JULIA. Yes, dear. I know...

ANNIE. [Seeing the others.] Who?...

JULIA. They are all friends; they will help you. Come, dear... lie down
again.

ANNIE. Oh, what shall I do?

[Is led off, sobbing.]

JULIA. It will be all right, dear.

[Exit; a pause.]

HEGAN. What does this mean?

JACK. [Promptly and ruthlessly.] It means that you have been seeing the
white-slave traffic in action.

HEGAN. I don't understand.

JACK. [Quietly, but with suppressed passion.] Tens of thousands of girl
slaves are needed for the markets of our great cities... for the lumber
camps of the North, the mining camps of the West, the ditches of Panama.
And every four or five years the supply must be renewed, and so the
business of gathering these girl-slaves from our slums is one of the
great industries of the city. This girl, Annie Rogers, a decent girl
from the North of Ireland, was lured into a dance hall and drugged, and
then taken to a brothel and locked in a third-story room. They took her
clothing away from her, but she broke down her door at night and fled to
the street in her wrapper and flung herself into Miss Patterson's arms.
Two men were pursuing her... they tried to carry her off. Miss Patterson
called a policeman... but he said the girl was insane. Only by making a
disturbance and drawing a crowd was my friend able to save her. And now,
we have been the rounds... from the sergeant at the station, and the
police captain, to the Chief of Police and the Mayor himself; we have
been to the Tammany leader of the district