"Open this door!" she commanded. "Let me out of here at once."

The pale girl started to do so, but the pretty one held her back. "No,

Nellie; Madam will be angry with us all if you open that door." Then she

turned to Elizabeth, and said: "Whoever enters that door never goes out again. You are nicely caught, my

dear."

There was a sting of bitterness and self-pity in the taunt at the end of

the words. Elizabeth felt it, as she seized her pistol from her belt, and

pointed it at the astonished group. They were not accustomed to girls with

pistols. "Open that door, or I will shoot you all!" she cried.

Then, as she heard some one descending the stairs, she rushed again into

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the room where she remembered the windows were open. They were guarded by

wire screens; but she caught up a chair, and dashed it through one,

plunging out into the street in spite of detaining hands that reached for

her, hands much hindered by the gleam of the pistol and the fear that it

might go off in their midst.

It took but an instant to wrench the bridle from its fastening and mount

her horse; then she rode forward through the city at a pace that only

millionaires and automobiles are allowed to take. She met and passed her

first automobile without a quiver. Her eyes were dilated, her lips set;

angry, frightened tears were streaming down her cheeks, and she urged her

poor horse forward until a policeman here and there thought it his duty to

make a feeble effort to detain her. But nothing impeded her way. She fled

through a maze of wagons, carriages, automobiles, and trolley-cars, until

she passed the whirl of the great city, and at last was free again and out

in the open country.

She came toward evening to a little cottage on the edge of a pretty

suburb. The cottage was covered with roses, and the front yard was full of

great old-fashioned flowers. On the porch sat a plain little old lady in a

rocking-chair, knitting. There was a little gate with a path leading up to

the door, and at the side another open gate with a road leading around to

the back of the cottage.

Elizabeth saw, and murmuring, "O 'our Father,' please hide me!" she dashed

into the driveway, and tore up to the side of the piazza at a full gallop.

She jumped from the horse; and, leaving him standing panting with his nose

to the fence, and a tempting strip of clover in front of him where he

could graze when he should get his breath, she ran up the steps, and flung

herself in a miserable little heap at the feet of the astonished old lady.




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