Milton.

The only additional letters he received were those which belonged to his
correspondence with the people in Washington who were interested in his
electrical patent. The circular glass incubator was finally completed,
and Bauer had experimented on it to such satisfaction that it was a
common joke with the boy that Bauer's electrical chickens were so thick
they ate up all the currents in the shop.

Bauer could afford to take all the criticism, even the caustic remarks
of Anderson the foreman, because it began to look now very much as if
the stubborn, dogged, plodding German were on the road to financial
success. He had been through the regular struggles necessary to make his
model and get his patent. But he had finally succeeded in all the
preliminary stages, his model was in the patent office, and he had even
begun to receive letters from two or three manufacturing firms about
putting the incubator on the market.

He was totally inexperienced in this business and needed much counsel
from older heads. Anderson the foreman finally saw that Bauer had really
invented a very valuable article and he came to his assistance in the
final correspondence over the patent, but Bauer had some reluctance
about sharing with him the correspondence over the actual manufacture
and sale of the incubators, because of Anderson's unfortunate habit of
antagonising the shop men in various matters. He had never been able to
overcome a general distrust on the part of the students, and Bauer
shared that distrust so keenly that he did not feel willing to risk any
great amount of confidence in him.

Since his return from Milton, Bauer had brooded over money matters. A
small inheritance from his grandfather's estate in Lausbrachen had
helped him through school, and his living wants were so few that he had
not suffered any from privations which most of the rich men's sons at
Burrton would have considered absolutely impossible.

But a new and unknown ambition had invaded Bauer's hitherto placid and
somewhat passive soul since Helen Douglas had come into his circle of
interest. What was it the girl had said during that talk in the library
that day when she had made a vow not to speak first and had broken it?
Bauer remembered every phase of that incident; the girl's real sparkle
of interest in his invention; her eager questions; her coming up to the
library table and bending over Bauer's plan; her head so close to his
that a stray curl of her