She had left the station far, far behind and Madison Avenue was nowhere within sight.
The twine that Theresa had fastened about her bundle and that had threatened to break from the time she started out, gave way with a snap. She would have to gather up the loose ends and knot them as best she could to prevent her clothes from strewing the pavement. While she was bungling awkwardly over this, balancing the bundle unsteadily against her knee, some one ran heavily against her and in an instant her bundle was on the sidewalk. She dared not turn her head or look around for she felt pretty sure that whoever had jostled her had done it “on purpose,” since there was no crowd here and the street was wide. But the next instant she heard a shrill whistle, a coarse laugh and then a rough voice crying jeeringly:
“My eyes! But if this ain’t a go! Blest if here isn’t the fine young lady that lives on the Avenoo! The lady that ran away with my papers one day along las’ spring! Hi, though, you don’t get off so easy this time, sis! I owes you one an’ I’m honest, I am. When I owes, I pays, see?”
She turned her head, lifted her eyes and stared straight into the mischievous, leering face of her old enemy—the newsboy.
CHAPTER XII
HOME AGAIN
Strangely enough the sight seemed to give her courage. She looked fearlessly up at him and met his twinkling eyes without flinching.
“Well, you are a cool one!” he exclaimed appreciatively.
Polly’s fingers fumbled with the string of her recaptured bundle, but she said nothing, nor did she remove her gaze from his face.