Chub Tuttle passed on the opposite side of the way, and, ceasing to hum as he trudged serenely homeward, began to whistle not unmelodiously. The notes of “The Last Rose of Summer” came drifting back to the ears of Charley Shultz, growing fainter and fainter in the distance and sounding inexpressibly sad. Shultz thought it must be getting darker, and was amazed, on rubbing them, to find that his eyes were moist and blurred. He leaned against the tree and listened, almost against his will, as the whistling grew fainter and yet fainter, softened and sweetened by the distance. When he could hear it no longer he gave himself a savage shake. “You fool!” he rasped. “What’s the matter with you? You never felt like this before. You’re growing silly.” Reaching Willow Street, he gazed toward Hooker’s home, but, even had the darkness not prevented him from seeing the house, it stood so far back on the Middle Street corner that he could not have surveyed it from his present position. Dread heavily upon him, yet hope not entirely dead, he walked slowly up the street. He had almost reached the corner when he stopped again. He could see the house now, and his heart hammered furiously as he perceived that something was taking place there. There were lights flashing from room to room; he heard excited voices calling; the house was in a commotion. “What’s that mean? What’s that mean?” whispered Shultz over and over. Suddenly the door of the house was flung open. A man came running out, some one calling after him. Down the steps he sprang; across Lake Street he dashed; along Middle Street he raced. Panting, one hand clutching a nearby fence-railing, Shultz was certain he knew the cause of this commotion. Mr. Hooker was running for the doctor. They had just discovered that Roy was dead. Turning sharply about, Schultz ran also. CHAPTER XVIII FLIGHT. As he ran, the terrible fear that had clung to him grew to gigantic proportions. Panting and gasping, he exerted every effort in that first burst of speed. The sound of his flying feet echoed through the silent streets, and those echoes, flung back to his ears, made it seem that a part of the sound was produced by other feet than his own. It seemed that there was a fearsome pursuer at his very heels, reaching for him with eager, clawlike hands. He dared not pause an instant in his flight to look back. On and on he ran, down through Cross Street, retracing his course up the slope to Lake Street, and still on past the silent and gloomy academy. From exhaustion and lack of breath his pace had slackened perforce. In all his experience in athletics, never before had he exerted himself until, the breath wholly pumped from his lungs, he could only gasp in exquisite pain, while his very head threatened to burst. At length, just beyond the academy, he stumbled and fell. Half stunned by the shock, he fully expected to feel himself pounced upon by that unknown pursuer.