The door to my studio opened slowly. A beautiful girl entered. She said hesitantly, “My name is Corinna. Is this where I am supposed to go?”

“Yes it is, Corinna. Please come in, close the door after you, and sit down on the easy chair. I have been looking forward to your visit.” Corinna walked in, closed the door, and seated herself, modesty pulling her dress over her knees.

I told her, “I see you are wearing a blue dress in good taste that suggests your curves without flaunting them. That is the image we want our models to project. So far you have passed our selection process excellently. Only one test remains, and we are sure you can pass.”

“Thank you so much,” she said with relief. “I was afraid you called me in here to tell me I did not pass.”

“That is hardly the case,” I began. “Your loveliness, poise, and charm were praised. Now that I can look at you, I think the praise of you was understated.”

Corinna smiled nervously and giggled nervously. “Tell me about yourself,” I suggested.

“Well, let’s see,” she began. “I have graduated from high school. Before I go to college, I want to try several jobs, and see what I want to do, and what I can do. Too many young people go to college, major in something that interests them, and graduate to find out that what they majored in is not very useful on the job market.”

“Do you have any hobbies?”

“I read a lot. I am interested in English and American literature of the Romantic Era. Edgar Allen Poe is my favorite author.”

“Why do you like him?”

“I share his interest in the past. I have to admit that I find his occasional writing about violence exciting. I like the purity with which he deals with romantic love. Someone wrote that he is often macabre, but he never wrote anything that brings a blush to the cheeks of a virgin. He never caused me to blush.”

“I am also interested in religion and political stuff,” she continued. “I have read the King James Bible from cover to cover to cover, including the Apocrypha. I am not fanatical about my beliefs. I am an Episcopalian and a moderate Democrat. You can’t get more mainstream than that.

“Why did you decide to become a model?” I asked.

“It wasn’t my idea really. Two of my girl friends suggested it. I am very shy, and do not think I am pretty enough. On my eighteenth birthday party a week ago they talked about it again. I decided to give it a try. If I failed, they would stop pestering me about it.”

“We are certainly glad you tried. Why did you choose our modeling agency?”

“I like the way you only work with virgins. I would not want to work with an agency with a hostile environment that expected me to have sex with important clients. My parents would not allow that.”

“Do you have a boyfriend?”

“Not really. I have been on a few dates. It was nothing serious. I am shy, so I have difficulty talking to boys.”

“It may not have been serious for you. I am confident that each of those boys has a crush on you. They will remember the time they spent with you forever.”

“They are nice like you, but they are not eloquent like you.”

“I suspect that any boy who looks at you falls in love with you. I know I would have.”

“What about now.”

“You are not too young for me. I am too old for you.”

Her face projected melancholy and understanding beyond her years.

“If I may ask, why are you still a virgin?”

“I am not interested in casual sex and sexual variety. The girls I know who have had sex with guys tell me it was disappointing. The man I want to get married to will want me to be a virgin. He might be one too. If he loves me he will be willing to wait.”

“Some girls enjoy casual sex and sexual variety,” she continued. “Most girls don’t, but we are told that we should, and that if we don’t, there is something wrong with us. An older friend of mine told me that the more men a woman has sex with the harder it is to say ‘No’ to the next one, and the less likely he is to stay. I don’t want to get trapped into that.”

I replied, “Because our models are known to be virgins, men ask to be introduced to them. We screen the men before introducing them. We chaperone their early dates. Several of our models have married men who first saw them on our website. By accounts those marriages are working. I have read in “The Hidden Agenda of the Political Mind” that in marriages where both partners are virgins, only fifteen percent of the marriages result in divorce. Children raised by both biological parents living together in matrimony tend to have many fewer problems in life. We fund the weddings of our models who get married.”

“I want to be married in my church,” Corinna said.

“We would not want it any other way. How does it feel to be eighteen?”

“I’m not sure. Kind of good, I guess. Sometimes I feel like I am still a little girl. In my bedroom I have two large stuffed animals that my parents gave me when I was little.”

“We would like to take some photos of you with those animals. Would your parents mind?”

“I do not see why they would. They know I am applying for a position as one of your models. They like the atmosphere you create for your models.”