"Oh! And what is this object that I am to look for and from which you fled five hundred miles?"
"I don't know."
"You don't know what you ran away from?"
"No, sir. Perhaps if I had known I should have run a thousand miles."
We eyed one another.
"You think, then, that I'd better send Miss Barrison back to New York?" I asked.
"I certainly do. It may be murder to take her."
"Then I'll do it!" I said, nervously. "Back she goes from the first railroad station."
In a flash the thought came to me that here was a way to avoid the wrath of Professor Farrago—and a good excuse, too. He might forgive my not bringing a man as stenographer in view of my limited time; he never would forgive my presenting him with a woman.
"She must go back," I repeated; and it rather surprised me to find myself already anticipating loneliness—something that never in all my travels had I experienced before.