Change She felt, rather than saw, the eyes on her. by John Davies The panic welled up in her again, from the pit of her stomach to her brain. She was terrified now. The sharp staccato clack of her high heels echoed back to her from the emptiness and darkness of the alleys past which she was now almost running. Beneath the sound of her own footsteps, she was beginning to feel the pounding of his as he increased his pace to match hers. The distance between them was decreasing. He was running too, she could tell. And the lights were still so far away. The scream began in her middle and pushed its way up to her throat as she saw the shadow come apace with her own. Terror took complete possession of her and the scream forced its way from between her clenched teeth as she felt the hand on her shoulder. Consciousness left her . . . Helen had made such wonderful plans for today. So seldom did she have a day off that she had to make one day do for everything. She had shopping to do that could only be done in the city and there were so many things to see. The mere idea of a day apart from the routine of teaching seventh grade monsters in a small town school was enticing in itself. But added to this was the allure of spending money, which was one of Helen's truly feminine weaknesses. As she had surveyed herself in the mirror early this morning, she had felt satisfied. Though she had no illusions of beauty in connection with her person, she knew that she was very attractive. The new white hat set off her brownish-red hair very well and it also set off the darkness of her brown eyes, which were set wide apart and deeply. Her naturally red mouth needed little lipstick, so she used it sparingly as she did other cosmetics. Helen took advantage of her delightfully feminine shape to distract attention from her not so attractive features such as her nose. Her nose was a little too pug to be beautiful and her mouth was wide and generous with full lips and belied her innocence to anyone interested in character study. She had bought a new suit for the occasion. This dream suit, which Helen had longed for for weeks, was well worth the exorbitant price she had paid for it. Black gabardine, tailored along the lines of Adrian, and just as smart. It had taken weeks of lunch money to pay for it. Helen had to admit that it did startling things for her figure. The combination of the white hat and gloves, black patent leather purse and shoes changed her from a plain school teacher into a very lovely young lady and she was very happy about the whole affair. Her day in the city began with coffee in the little hamburger stand near the bus depot and proceeded from there to the park in the center of the city where she could feed the pigeons. The next stop was the bookshop on the corner across from the park. She could browse to her heart's content and sample passages and paragraphs that were far above the level of her seventh grade textbooks. Here was the high spot of her day, since Helen was an avid reader and this constituted practically all of her cultural advancement since her graduation from normal school and subsequent acceptance of the position with which she was now bored to tears. The figure of which Helen was so proud was a result of physically satisfying her appetite for good food, and then mentally starving herself into slim-ness. Hers was the good fortune of possessing a naturally slim and healthy body. After giving way to these carnal desires and eating an excellent dinner in a moderately exclusive restaurant, the next most logical step seemed to her to be a good moving picture. She chanced upon a good double feature on which was billed an older picture that she had missed and a new one that was on her must list. Darkness had descended before the show ended and the realization came to her when the brightness of marquee lights struck her eyes that it must be quite late. A quick glance at her watch told her that she had missed the bus she originally intended to take home. Page Six With several hours on hand until the next bus, Helen wandered slowly along amusing herself with looking at all of the beautiful articles of jewelry and clothing and furniture in the store windows. At a corner her eyes caught a small sign reading "Curios" about half way down the block on a side street. Curiosity got the better of her, and acting on an impulse she headed for the shop. Ordinarily she would not have ventured off the main street, but she entertained ideas of obtaining a few knick-knacks to brighten her room at home and also of exploring, since she had no idea of what was contained inside a curio shop. The dimness inside made more enchanting the picture before her. Here were carved Buddhas in ebony and ivory, and a set of wrought gold toothpicks set in a little stand of ebony intricately carved, no doubt from China. Here was a display of deadly looking knives and swords from the Phillipine Islands and from Mongolia. Here were chests made of teak and of iron wood, some lined with cedar, and some with camphor. Here were Mandarin robes of pure silk and Japanese kimonas with delicate oil painted pastoral scenes on them. Helen was an incurable romantic and became lost in a reverie of thoughts in connection with those articles of oriental curiosa. She felt, rather than saw, the eyes on her. Her dreams interrupted, she turned and was shocked to look into the evil eyes which had been boring into her back. The man must have come in quietly because he had not been there when she came in. The gloom in the small shop made it difficult for her to discern his features clearly, but she could see that he was an immense man. The black shaggy hair and eyebrows accentuated the apparent pallor of his skin and the eyes which stared at her seemed to slant a bit as in an Oriental. The mouth seemed to be set in a perpetual leer and through the thin lips gleamed white teeth. Shock held Helen still for several seconds and she could not take away her gaze from the evil fascination of the eyes. For a seemingly endless time she stood rooted to the spot and then the spell broke and in confusion she picked up a set of Chinese monkeys, See No Evil, Hear No Evil and Speak No Evil, and handed a bill to the proprietor of the shop and rushed out of the door. With the tinkle of the small bell on the door, the confusion in her mind became apprehension and she headed rapidly down the street, still under the spell of the wickedness she had seen in those eyes. She had gone only a few feet when the sound of the bell on the shop's door came to her ears and glancing over her shoulder, she could make out the huge figure coming toward her. As she began to walk more rapidly, her eyes went before her seeking a haven of some sort, any place where there were some lights. She was stunned to see that she had turned the wrong direction from the shop and that the lights were several blocks away from her and in between lay only darkness and gloom. Her apprehension increased with the sound of his footsteps behind her. Realization that he was following her came suddenly. Panic welled up in her, making her knees shaky and the middle of her turn to water. "A taxicab, a policeman," she thought des-parately, "anything, anything at all." But a swift glance up the darkened street showed nothing but gloom and the black toothless mouths of alley after alley which she would have to pass in order to reach the lights far in front of her. The arm around her shoulders was firm and the face above hers was not black and evil, but merely homely. And as she came more into this world, she saw that it was not a leer, but the result of a scar over the corner of his mouth. The soft southern drawl was as much a shock as the transfiguration of the face as she heard the end of the sentence, ". . . terribly sorry, Ma'am, but you left all this change." Panic welled up in her, making her knees shaky and the middle of her turn to water. Page Seven