Volume I Part 21 (1/2)
”Rather not.” Then Michael added defiantly, ”But I jolly well wish I had.”
”She wouldn't let you, would she?”
”That's what I can't find out,” Michael said despondently. ”I've held her hand and all that sort of rot, and I've talked about how pretty I think she is, but it's beastly difficult. I say, you know, I don't believe I should ever be able to propose to a girl--you know--a girl you could marry--a lady. I'm tremendously gone on Dora and so are you on Winnie. But I don't think they're ladies, because Dora's got a sister who's in a pantomime and wears tights, so you see I couldn't propose to her. Besides, I should feel a most frightful fool going down on my knees in the path. Still I must kiss her somehow. Look here, Alan, if you promise faithfully you'll kiss Winnie to-morrow, when the clock strikes twelve, I'll kiss Dora. Will you? Be a decent chap and kiss Winnie, even if you aren't beastly keen, because I am. So will you, Alan?”
There was a minute's deliberation by Alan in the darkness, and then he said he would.
”I say, you are a clinker, Alan. Thanks most awfully.”
Michael turned over and settled himself down to sleep, praying for the good luck to dream of his little girl in blue.
On the next morning Alan and Michael eyed each other bashfully across the breakfast table, conscious as they were of the guilty vow not yet fulfilled. Miss Carthew tried in vain to make them talk. They ate in silence, oppressed with resolutions. They saw Winnie and Dora in Devons.h.i.+re Park at eleven o'clock, and presently went their different ways along the mazy paths. Michael talked of subjects most remote from love. He expounded to Dora the ranks of the British Army; he gave her tips on birds'-nesting; he told her of his ambition to join the Bengal Lancers and he boasted of the exploits of the St. James' Football Fifteen. Dora giggled the minutes away, and at five minutes to twelve they were on a seat, screened against humanity's intrusion. Michael listened with quickening pulses to the thump of tennis b.a.l.l.s in the distance. At last he heard the first stroke of twelve and looked apprehensively towards Dora. Four more strokes sounded, but Michael still delayed. He wondered if Alan would keep his promise. He had heard no scream of dismay or startled giggle from the shrubbery. Then as the final stroke of midday crashed forth, he flung his arms round Dora, pressed her to him and in his confusion kissed very roughly the tilted tip of her nose.
”Oh, you cheek!” she gasped.
Then Michael kissed her lips, coldly though they were set against his love.
”I say, kiss me,” he whispered, with a strange new excitement crimsoning his cheeks and rattling his heart so loudly that he wondered if Dora noticed anything.
”Shan't!” murmured Dora.
”Do.”
”Oh, I couldn't,” she said, wriggling herself free. ”You have got a cheek. Fancy kissing anyone.”
”Dora, I'm frightfully gone on you,” affirmed Michael, choking with the emotional declaration. ”Are you gone on me?”
”I like you all right,” Dora confessed.
”Well then, do kiss me. You might. Oh, I say, do.”
He leaned over and sought those unresponsive lips that, mutely cold, met his. He spent a long time trying to persuade her to give way, but Dora protested she could not understand why people kissed at all, so silly as it was.
”But it's not,” Michael protested. ”Or else everybody wouldn't want to do it.”
However, it was useless to argue with Dora. She was willing to put her curly golden head on his shoulder, until he nearly exploded with sentiment; she seemed not to mind how often he pressed his lips to hers; but all the time she was pa.s.sive, inert, drearily unresponsive. The deeper she seemed to shrink within herself and the colder she stayed, the more Michael felt inclined to hurt her, to shake her roughly, almost to draw blood from those soft lifeless lips. Once she murmured to him that he was hurting her, and Michael was in a quandary between an overwhelming softness of pity and an exultant desire to make her cry out sharply with pain. Yet as he saw that golden head upon his shoulder, the words and tune of 'Two little girls in blue' throbbed on the air, and with an aching fondness Michael felt his eyes fill with tears. Such love as his for Dora could never be expressed with the eloquence and pa.s.sion it demanded.
Michael and Alan had tacitly agreed to postpone all discussion of their pa.s.sionate adventure until the blackness of night and secret intimacy of their bedroom made the discussion of it possible.
”I say, I kissed Dora this morning,” announced Michael.
”So did I Winnie,” said Alan.
”She wouldn't kiss me, though,” said Michael.
”Wouldn't she?” Alan echoed in surprize, ”Winnie kissed me.”
”She didn't!” exclaimed Michael.
”She did, I swear she did. She kissed me more than I kissed her. I felt an awful fool. I nearly got up and walked away. Only I didn't like to.”