Page:The Black Cat November 1916.djvu/48

44 can see all right. And please tell me the truth. I can stand it. I'd really rather not be flattered. This way." He threw open the door and walked in familiarly.

But before Ivy had taken a step she heard a sound,—a heavy rasping sound as of some one using a meat saw on a taut rope, She stood stockstill.

"What's that?" she whispered timorously. In spite of the role she was playing, her voice trembled. Her misgivings took shape and she reprimanded herself for being placed in such a position. "What's that?" she repeated.

"Come on," came her guide's voice from within the room. "It's only my room-mate. He sleeps like a log—in a sawmill. The lights won't wake him. Come on. And be careful of that chair—to the right of the door."

But Ivy was running away. On tiptoe she slipped down the corridor in the dark and, hearing him stumble over a chair and call out again softly, she stole down the stairway in mouselike silence. It was plain desertion. Yet the absurdity of it made her want to laugh aloud.

She ran a block after she had left the building, then stopped to look around. But before she could discover where she was, to her surprise, almost consternation, she caught sight of a tall shadow a block away,—a fleeting figure in headlong pursuit. She caught her breath. Pursuit! She hadn't dreamed he'd follow. For a moment she stood almost breathless, while he hammered on toward her.

Afterward she could recollect that a precious instant had been wasted while the thought flashed into her mind that she was glad in a wild, unaccountable way that the boy was following her. Then she had fled.

The rest of that mad chase she remembered as a breathless nightmare, a mere chaos of impressions. There was one vivid recollection of a narrow escape when, dodging about in a parked square, only his stumbling over a "Keep Off" sign had saved her. She had sped away, smock knotted about her waist, hair uncoiffed but safe in the bagging fold of the tam-o'shanter, free-limbed and swift, only a boy running in the shadows.

A street, darker than the rest, presented itself, its narrow opening partly concealed by a projecting porch. Dimly she realized that it led to a less admirable part of the city, but she could not halt. Into it she turned, running on tiptoe so that he might not hear her when he came to the corner behind. A short block and then a turn; another short block and a blank wall.

In consternation, Ivy paused. Back against the wall, her breast rising and falling in tumult, she listened. Only the city's sounding silence fell on her ears for long minutes that seemed like hours. She relaxed. The sigh she gave was genuine, not of relief, but akin to disappointment. Because now that she had escaped she felt sorry for the boy whom she had treated so badly—not intentionally, but badly, nevertheless. Then she remembered that he had been intent only on regaining his fleeing art critic; he had not known that this was a girl he pursued; he had given chase for none but selfish reasons. Indeed, she had fled to