I ran after them, of course, but they were nowhere in sight when I
reached the parallel wharf, and so I started for the street; and Anson
C. Doughty saw me, for he was running up and down the sidewalk, wildly
hunting for a policeman. When he undertook to head me off I pitched the
wrapped skull at him with all my might; it plunked him squarely in the
face and dropped him, and then went bounding along the pavement at a
lively clip. I was conscious that a lot of people were looking on and
that a hullabaloo was started. But in spite of that I stopped to pick
up the skull before I fled from the place. I reckon I must have felt
considerable of a sense of responsibility where the interests of my
friends, the Voses, were concerned!
I got through a short street on the jump, caught a passing car and when
I was once aboard I was lost to pursuers--I was merely one of the city’s
mass, and my garments testified for me.
I dug down into my pockets and found a few crumpled bills and some
silver--the loose money I carried outside my wallet. The whole of it
amounted to mighty little--only about enough to take me to Levant, as I
remembered what the train fare had been.
I did not stop to figure on any further resources; I did not dare to go
and seek aid from any of my acquaintances; I did not go back to my room
for any of my belongings. Panic was on me. To be caught at that time
meant the toppling of my cardboard house of hopes and reputation. I
did not know to what extent Anson C. Doughty would throw out his
drag-net--but I was pretty sure that he would drop all his other
business for a time and attend strictly to what concerned me. He surely
was the angriest man I had seen in many a day when he went down under
the impact of that package.
To get out of that city just as quickly as I could, before he could set
persons on my trail, or put spies at the city’s outlets, was the only
sensible course open to me.
So in less than half an hour I found myself on the train, homeward
bound, just as much of a fugitive _from_ the city as I had been in other
days when I headed _toward_ it.