But while Felix Bauer was simple hearted and clear souled as day himself, he did possess to a remarkable degree the power of self-possession and self-restraint. His soul had already to a certain degree learned the sad lesson of bearing disaster with calm inward poise. Whatever the tragedy might mean to him in the future, he was not so poor spirited as to let it ruin his own development or poison the peace of others. So he was able to say, after what seemed to Helen only a natural hesitation: "My people were both born in Germany. My mother was the daughter of the American Consul. I was born in this country. That accounts for my being so good a patriot." "And I suppose it also accounts for your unusually good use of English. Do you know you speak very correct and pure English, Mr. Bauer?" "No, do I?" "Yes, that is, what little you speak," said Helen with a smile. "Do you want to know what I asked Walter in one of my letters?" "Yes," said Bauer, blushing. "I asked him if you spoke broken English very badly?" Bauer did not reply to this and Helen came back to the question of his home life. "Do your folks live in Washington now?" "Yes, that is"--all Bauer's self restraint could not avoid betraying something, and Helen looked at him quickly, and her quick eager mind could not avoid detecting something wrong. She would not for the world have been guilty of a vulgar curiosity or an intrusion into another's secret, and she had enough tact to say at once: "I've always wanted to go to Washington. Father has promised to take me some time. There must be a great deal of happiness there?" Bauer looked at her, his great eyes calmly sad. Then he quoted: "'Gluck und Glas wie bald bricht das?'" Helen did not know enough German to understand. "Would you mind translating?" "'Happiness and glass, how soon they are broken.'" "You mean some kinds of happiness, don't you?" asked Helen timidly. "Yes, some kinds." "I hope you have had some of the unbreakable kind during your visit here?" "Yes." But down deep in his quiet soul Felix Bauer was almost saying to himself, "Will it be for me the heart-breaking kind of happiness?" After another interlude, which the assertive clock took advantage of, Helen said, "I wish you would tell me something about your work at Burrton." "My work?" "Yes, your shop work. Your invention work. You know we were all terribly disappointed that you and Walter did not get the patent. But there are a great many other chances to discover things, aren't there?" "Well, yes. I suppose there are." Bauer began to wake up mentally. His face took on an alert look and the glow of the born inventor enveloped his whole being. "You see, Miss Douglas, the field of electricity is in one sense limitless. We know so little about it. And I suppose it is true that new things are possible to an extent beyond our imagination." "You mean inventions?" "Yes?"