"Of course you could. If she's any good as a sport, she'd rather have you, hairless myopiac that you are, than a tailor's dummy."

Sayre said: "Isn't it a terrible thing, Curtis, to think of that sweet, lovely young girl pledged to a scientific life like that? P-pledged to p-p-propagate p-p-perfection?"

"What a mean-spirited creature that fellow Willett must be," observed Langdon in disgust; "and the other three—Ugh!"

"Why?"

"To tamely submit to being kidnapped and woo'd and wed that way—endure the degradation of a captivity among all those young girls——"

Sayre said: "Would you call for help if kidnapped?"

Langdon gazed into space: "I wonder," he murmured.

Sayre looked at him searchingly.

"I don't believe you'd make the welkin ring with your yelps. It's probably the same with those four men."

"Probably."