When she awoke, she was sitting up. Dawn was at hand. She could tell that by the thin, white horizontal lines of the shutters. She sprang out of bed and began to dress.
Once she had packed to run away. There was no time to pack now. To go, that was her only thought. She ran a comb through her hair. She threw her serge coat over her arm, and took her hat in her hand. Then with a hurried good-bye kiss for her mother’s pictured face, she stole out and down, bound for New York, and the dear apartment, and faithful Sally.
CHAPTER XXI
It was a glorious morning. The sun was not up yet, so the air was cool—even crisp; and Phœbe, making her way quietly through the rear gate and along that road used by the tradesmen, had to slip on her coat. She halted a moment under some trees that stood, occupying a whole lot, between the Blair house and the railroad station. And as she settled her coat, the birds called down at her. They were just awaking!
Phœbe had no thought of taking a train for New York. In the first place, she had no money, having spent her last penny at the theatre; in the second place, the station-agent knew her, and would report her departure. She did not even go near the station. What she did was to take her direction from it down the long macadam road that led, straight and smooth, beside the double line of rails.
That way lay New York! She would walk till an automobile came by. Then she would ride as far as possible, perhaps walk some more, sleep at pleasant farm-houses along the route, take up her journey the following morning, and thus, by easy stages, reach the loved city and Sally.
The whole plan seemed so feasible that as she turned into the road at a point well south of the station, she wondered why she had never thought of it before. And it was so jolly, trotting along like this! She felt free, and strong, and happy. And very brave.
“Mother would want me to leave there,” she told herself. “She never liked any of them.”
The sun came up. The birds began their morning songs. Phœbe took off her coat, then her hat. When she spied an automobile rushing toward her from the distance, she went aside to crouch in the deep, weed-grown ditch that stretched between the wagon road and the track, covered her face with her coat, stayed motionless for a few minutes—then went merrily on.
It was the first eluding of a car bound town-ward that made her think how exciting this adventure of hers was. And with that thought came another—a wonderful one! It made her heart beat fast. She fairly skipped. Tears of joy sprang to her eyes. She would be a moving-picture actress! And act with William S. Hart!