He asked no questions about how they were making out, he told them nothing about what he had been doing. Instead he asked, "Has she arrived yet?"
"She?" The word was chorused by the trio.
"Yes," Bowdler said, his expression changing and worry showing on it. "She should have been here by now if she escaped from the R.A.'s." Shaking his head, he sat down in one of the big comfortable chairs that were scattered all around the library. "She's the best possibility I've found since you three. Courageous, with a real brain in her head. I hope she's not been captured."
Grundy, Comstock and Helen stifled the questions which were crowding to their lips, questions about the house, about the books, about the reason for their having been sequestered so long. In the face of Bowdler's worry, their questions seemed picayune.
"When should she have arrived?" Comstock asked.
"This morning. I helped her get away last night, gave her directions, and then turned off the force field that's been protecting the house and you three in my absence. If she doesn't appear soon, I'll have to turn it back on. I can't risk having the R.A.'s stumble on this retreat of mine."
"Force field?" Grundy asked timorously.
"Sure, a smaller version of the thing that the last scientists built to protect our whole planet from interlopers. Unseen, it blankets the whole area around the house in an invisible sheath that keeps anyone from even being aware of the house."
So that, Comstock thought, was why they had heard no one, seen no one passing by.