Then Helen looked up suddenly and burst out: "That horrid Mr. Damon proposed to me last night! I went with him to the organ recital and he was very nice at first, but on the way home he made a fool of himself and tried to make one of me. I told him I wouldn't marry him if he was the only man left. Why, mother, he is ten years older than I am, and he has false teeth and I believe he wears a wig and he makes a living selling rubber goods!" And at that Helen burst into a flood of weeping, laying her head down in her mother's lap. When she was cried out, Esther said: "Mr. Damon is a good man, or I wouldn't have let you go with him. But I had no idea he was thinking of you that way. Of course he is out of the question. Not on account of the false teeth, the wig and the rubber goods, for women marry men with those encumbrances every day and are happy, but for other reasons." "Mother, did you ever have any other proposals besides father's?" "Yes, I had three while I was in college." "At my age?" "I was two years younger." "That makes me feel better some; but I don't want such things to come to me. It frightens me." "Daughter, you probably know you are more than good looking. Do you?" "Yes," said Helen, in a low tone. "It is a great gift, but it is a dangerous one. You must use it in the right way." "Mother, I do try. I am not a flirt, am I, mother?" Helen looked up appealingly. "Look right into my eyes, mother, and see?" Mrs. Douglas looked and with a sigh of relief saw there as pure and womanly a soul waiting development as ever lived. "No, thank God, Helen, I believe you realise what your beauty might mean to bless or to curse. But sometimes the hurt comes in spite of one's self." There was a very long pause and then Helen said timidly, "Mother, you are thinking of someone in particular. I have tried to be very careful. I had to be kind. But how could I know------" "You mean Felix Bauer?" "Yes, mother." "Do you mean he has spoken to you in so short a time?" "No, no, mother, not spoken. Only, only, looked at me. You don't blame me, do you, do you, mother?" Helen began to cry again, but in a different way from the outburst before. She cried softly and Mrs. Douglas could feel the girl's hand pressing her arm convulsively. She was really puzzled to know what to say in spite of the evident fact that Felix Bauer had simply yielded to the inevitable through no fault of Helen's or anybody's. At last she said: "Do you feel superior to Mr. Bauer?" Helen raised her head and blushed as she looked up. "Why, no, that is, of course, he knows German and I don't, and he knows a lot about electricity and I don't and--and------" "He's not much of a talker," said her mother. "No, but on that account he avoids saying so many foolish things. And he is very interesting, and, and, good. But he is only a poor student and it looks now as if he might grow up to be nothing but a manufacturer of incubators to raise chickens."