"He has good features, and a polished address."
"Yes; but do you like his looks?"
"No; I do not desire his acquaintance."
"Nor I; he's not the sort that papa and grandpa would wish us to know."
"No; so let us keep out of his way."
"But without seeming to do so?"
"Oh, yes; as far as we can. We don't wish to hurt his feelings or his mother's."
They carried out their plan of avoidance, and so skilfully that neither mother nor son was quite sure it was intended. In fact, it was difficult for them to believe that any girl could wish to shun the attentions of a young man so attractive in every way as was Clarence Augustus Faude.
"I should like you to marry one of those girls," the mother said to her son, chatting alone with him in her own room; "you could not do better, for they are beautiful, highly educated and accomplished, and will have large fortunes."
"Which?" he added sententiously, and with a smile that seemed to say, he was conscious that he had only to take his choice.