I must have deserved this punishment. Aside from the unhappy nature of my feelings, I was suffering severe bodily discomfort from some small object, a stone, I think, pressed against my ribs. I moved slightly and there was a resounding crackle of broken twigs. The silken foot beside me started suddenly.
"What was that?" whispered the girl.
"Oh," said Jerry, "merely a squirrel or—or a chipmunk." And then more convincingly, "Yes, I think it was a chipmunk."
I held my breath in an agony of apprehension, expecting each second to be hauled out of my retreat by Jerry's muscular hand on my collar, and it was therefore with a feeling of manifest relief that I heard their conversation resumed.
"I'm so glad you think a kiss is a sacrament," she murmured. "It should be—shouldn't it?—a pledge," and then, "But that was such a light one, Jerry—"
He kissed her again. There was a long silence—long. She had won.
"Oh, Jerry," she sighed at last, "it is so sweet. You have never kissed me like that before. Why, what is the matter?"
Jerry, it seemed, had risen suddenly. "I—I mustn't, Marcia. I mustn't. It is sweet—but—but terrible. I can't tell you—"
"Terrible, Jerry?"
"Yes, I can't explain. It's a kind of profanation—your sanctity. I don't know. It makes me deliriously happy and—horribly miserable."