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more thatreighteen.'so we cannot hold you. Wl'ee'Will you go?" "
"I'm going back," she cried. "Where do you suppose I'm going.
going back sporting."
The judge raised his hand as though he meant to silence her, but she
did not heed him.
"I need the money," she said. "I can earn it that way and not any
other way. So I'm going--back."
"You could do something else," gasped the astonished judge.
Again she laughed, and she insolently turned and surveyed the women
in the courtroom the social workers, and then Iopked back again at the
judge.
"Oh, could. I?" she jeered. "It's a lot you know about it. I know. I
know where I can go and where I can't I know where the women of this
city whom you call good are willing to have me go. Straight to Hell, that's
where. So I'm going back.
To greatly surprised to speak, Judge Krichbaum and Sheriff Oberlin
stared open-mouthed at the girl as
she laughed tauntingly again, lifted
her little head defiantly and marched
from the courtroom.
One of the women visitors in the
court sprang toward the door through
which the girl passed, but she hesi
tated, and came back.
From a window they watched
"Babe" as she hurried across the
public square, and turned down East
Seventh street toward the "Jungles."
Judge Krichbaum mopped bis fore
head with his handkerchief. 'Sheriff
Oberlin frowned and paced the court
room floor.
"She's gone back all right, and
now what are we going to do about
it?" the sheriff asked, finally.
"We have got to start a Big Sister
movement in Canton," suggested
Probation Officer A. U. Bordner.
The woman officers of local uplift
organizations, who had sat white
faced and stunned, crowded forward.
"We are willing. We are more
than willing. We are anxious to help
these girls."
And in Canton before the first of
the year the W. C. T. U. and several
other women's organizations will
have plans completed for the "Can
ton Big Sister Association."
"We are in earnest," the women
say. "We have hesitated long
enough. It was terrible to hear that
child arraign the 'good women' and
say we wanted her to go to Hell."
Chief of Police Smith has come out
with a second remedy.
"I am going after the men who own
those dives," he announced. "There
isn't any use in harassing those poor
girls so long as men owning houses
are willing to rent them for immoral
purposes.
"Of course, Canton has houses of
ill-repute. But what's thetuse of even
arresting the women in charge of
them? Others will come in and rent
the houses. But we can attack the
owners through the state law."
"We couldn't prove the girl was
under eighteen," Judge Krischbaum
said today, "so we had to let her go.
I was compelled to let her walk back
to the life from which she had been
taken. I hope never again to hear a
child like that so bitterly arraign
good women. It is time that there
was a better understanding, and Hie
Big Sister movement will bring that
about."
"The resort from which the girl
was taken in a raid a week ago is run
ning again," said Sheriff Oberlin.
"She's probably back there again, and
it's a shame. I never heard such a
terrible statement as that girl made
in open court."
"Did you hear what she said ? 'I'm
going back sporting. I need the
money and that's the only way I can
raise it.' And that about the good
women wanting her to go to Hell, and
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