Philadelphia at Last

"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
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.