By now it was obvious that Hauptwanger was achieving a conquest of sorts and his companions over the way were abandoning their advantageous position, no longer hopefully interested by the possibility of defeat. But the nervous Ida, intrigued though terrified, was thinking how wonderful it was to at last interest so handsome a youth as this. Even though her father might not approve, still might not all that be overcome by such a gallant as this? But her hair was not bobbed, her skirts not short, her lips not rouged. Could it really be that he was attracted by her physical charms? His dark brown and yet hard and eager eyes—his handsome hands. The smart way in which he dressed. She was becoming conscious of her severely plain blue dress with white trimmings, her unmodish slippers and stockings. At the same time she found herself most definitely replying: “Oh, now, I couldn’t ever do anything like that, you know. You see, my father doesn’t know you. He wouldn’t let me go with any one he doesn’t know or to whom I haven’t been properly introduced. You know how it is.” “Well, couldn’t I introduce myself then? My father knows your father, I’m sure. I could just tell him that I want to call on you, couldn’t I? I’m not afraid of him, and there’s sure no harm in that, is there?” “Well, that might be all right, only he’s very strict—and he might not want me to go, anyhow.” “Oh, pshaw! But you would like to go, wouldn’t you? Or to a picture show? He couldn’t kick against that, could he?” He looked her in the eye, smiling, and in doing so drew the lids of his own eyes together in a sensuous, intriguing way which he had found effective with others. And in the budding Ida were born impulses of which she had no consciousness and over which she had no control. She merely looked at him weakly. The wonder of him! The beauty of love! Her desire toward him! And so finding heart to say: “No, maybe not. I don’t know. You see I’ve never had a beau yet.” She looked at him in such a way as to convince him of his conquest. “Easy! A cinch!” was his thought. “Nothing to it at all.” He would see Zobel and get his permission or meet her clandestinely. Gee, a father like that had no right to keep his daughter from having any fun at all. These narrow, hard-boiled German parents—they ought to be shown—awakened—made to come to life. And so, within two days brazenly presenting himself to Zobel in his store in order to test whether he could not induce him to accept him as presumably at least a candidate for his daughter’s favor. Supposing the affair did not prove as appealing as he thought, he could drop the contact, couldn’t he? Hadn’t he dropped others? Zobel knew of his father, of course. And while listening to Hauptwanger’s brisk and confident explanation he was quite consciously evaluating the smart suit, new tan shoes and gathering, all in all, a favorable impression. “You say you spoke to her already?” “I asked her if I might call on her, yes, sir.”