"How about that trap door set-up, Sergeant?"

The Sergeant held up a piece of thick wood, about two feet squared. It was designed to fit into the floor, with hinges on the inside. In the event of a raid, the gamblers threw the phones into a hole and slammed the door shut to conceal them. In closing, the trap door also threw a lever switch to disconnect the phones.

"When we got there," Cosgrove continued, "we hooked up the phones and began taking bets. We were on the phones--there were four of them, along with an adding machine and some other gambling materials--for over an hour."

"How was business?"

"Oh, a couple of hundred dollars worth. Pretty good. We figure, from the calls we got and these slips and envelopes we picked up, they must do around $50,000 a month. That's on the horses, a lottery racket, and some other numbers rackets. Hell, we got calls from all over. Some guy out in Milton wanted to lay a $50 bet on a horse."

A red-faced fellow from the Detective Bureau laughed. "I got a call from some guy out in Revere. He says to me, 'Hey, I hear they got cops all around the place outside. That right?' So I answered, 'Nah. No cops outside the place,' I says. So he gets sort of confused and says, "Huh? You sure?' And I start laughing and say, 'Sure I'm sure. They're right here. You're talking to one of them'."

"I guess that about wraps it up," the Sergeant said, throwing the evidence into a small carton. "Anything else you guys want to know?"

We answered no. "Except," the Post man said, "how is it you spell that guy's name again?"