The girl nodded. “Of course,” she answered readily. “He says he wants me to, and of course I can’t let him go alone. And yet, do you know, Joe, I don’t believe he really wants me to go at all?”
The reporter nodded slowly. The skein was still too tangled for him to unravel, but he was studying it intently. “Why go?” he asked. “Olga, I don’t want to be selfish. I have waited a long time, and I was prepared to keep on waiting as long as I could see you from time to time. But I can’t let you go away from me this way, especially to Russia. Why not marry me at once? Then I can speak to your father from a different footing. Perhaps I can persuade him to give up the trip.”
“If you only could! But——”
Bristow thought she was yielding and pushed his advantage. “Olga dear!” he urged. “Come to me.” He took the girl in his arms, and she gazed up into his face with the expression that a woman wears for one man only. “If I could, Joe,” she murmured. “If I only could! But I can’t; you know I can’t. Father would go alone, and I should never forgive myself.”
For a moment the reporter held her, looking tenderly into her blue eyes; then he released her. “Well,” he said briskly, “that settles it. I must talk to the Professor. I suppose he is in his laboratory?”
“Yes.”
“All right. I won’t be longer than I can help. Wait for me.”
When Bristow entered the laboratory, he found the Professor pacing up and down the room in a state of suppressed excitement. When he recognized his visitor, he strove to greet him calmly, but despite himself his irritation shone through.
“Mr. Bristow!” he exclaimed. “You’ve come about my note, I suppose?”
“Yes; that and——”