Calahan's saloon had never before in its history been
closed, and to have a green cop tell him to close it seemed to him so
incredible that he regarded it merely as a bad jest. On his next round
Bourke stepped in and repeated the order. Calahan felt that the jest
had gone too far, and by way of protest knocked Bourke down. This was
an error of judgment on his part, for when Bourke arose he knocked down
Calahan. The two then grappled and fell on the floor, while the "friends
of personal liberty" danced around the fight and endeavored to stamp on
everything they thought wasn't Calahan. However, Bourke, though pretty
roughly handled, got his man and shut the saloon. When he appeared
against the lawbreaker in court next day, he found the court-room
crowded with influential Tammany Hall politicians, backed by one or
two Republican leaders of the same type; for Calahan was a baron of
the underworld, and both his feudal superiors and his feudal inferiors
gathered to the rescue. His backers in court included a Congressman and
a State Senator, and so deep-rooted was the police belief in "pull"
that his own superiors had turned against Bourke and were preparing to
sacrifice him. Just at this time I acted on the information given me by
my newspaper friend by starting in person for the court.
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