She said good-bye, and as soon as she could do so unobserved, she quickened her ordinary pace to the quickest of which she was capable. She was frightened, unaccountably frightened. Perhaps it would have been wiser to have turned back, but to-day she could not endure his gaze, and there was no one else about. So she walked on, and on, and on, but suspected that he was gaining on her--she almost knew it. She dare not run on the high-road, but she trusted to the fact that she was more at home in the "Groves" than he was, and that she could slip away. She therefore left the road and made her way through the wood; she saw to her terror that he plunged into it as well, so she ventured to run up the hill, but in the direction from which he came; then she stooped down behind a large stone. She was quite successful, for almost directly afterwards she saw him pass by a little below the place where she crouched, her heart beating as though it would burst her dress. Here, where no one could see him, he ran, he climbed, he jumped--nothing checked his straight upward course. She waited till he was out of sight, and then ran off through the wood in the opposite direction from that in which he had gone; she did not stop till she found herself far above "The Estate" on a rock under a fir-tree, with leafy trees all round, and, while hot and panting she looked round her, thinking how wonderful the view was which she took in in a rapid glance, he rose before her mind's eye as he had looked when he hurried past the stone. He was horrible! That man could do anything! After that, she could never get rid of him. It was always he, nothing but he; or rather every moment of the day she fled from him, but he always reappeared. Her sisters reported to her that he hung about the house and looked in; walked past and looked in, talked to them, asked them to remember him to her. This immensely excited them, they were proud of it; his remark that Tora was "the handsomest girl" had reached them too. But Tora's terror increased; she was pursued. She knew that he would not give up. Where could she go to? None of the Rendalens were at home. She could go to them after the holidays, but nearly three weeks still remained. She could not speak to any one else, she was too much ashamed. She did not think once of shoemaker Hansen, but Fru Hansen was severe, she would not exactly understand. Her mother she never once thought of. But after all it was a thing which entirely concerned herself; she need be in no man's power if she did not choose. No, but when she could not by any means get him out of her thoughts?