“You have done something for me, you did a great deal,” he said, his voice almost husky with boyish tenderness. “I think it was the greatest thing that anybody ever did for me.”
“I did something for you! When? What?” questioned Starr curiously.
“Yes,” he said, “you did a great thing for me. Maybe you don’t remember it, but I do. It was when I was getting well from the shot there at your house, and your nurse used to bring you up to play with me every day; and always before you went away, you used to kiss me. I’ve never forgotten that.”
He said it quite simply as if it were a common thing for a boy to say to a girl. His voice was low as though the depths of his soul were stirred.
A flood of pretty color came into Starr’s cheeks.
“Oh!” she said quite embarrassed at the turn of the conversation, “but that was when I was a baby. I couldn’t do that now. Girls don’t kiss boys you know. It wouldn’t be considered proper.”
“I know,” said Michael, his own color heightening now, “I didn’t mean that. I wanted you to know how much you had done for me already. You don’t know what it is never to have been kissed by your mother, or any living soul. Nobody ever kissed me in all my life that I know of but you.”
He looked down at the little girl with such a grave, sweet expression, his eyes so expressive of the long lonely years without woman’s love, that child though she was Starr seemed to understand, and her whole young soul went forth in pity. Tears sprang to her eyes.
“Oh!” she said, “That is dreadful! Oh!—I don’t care if it isn’t proper—”
And before he knew what she was about to do the little girl tilted to her tiptoes, put up her dainty hands, caught him about the neck and pressed a warm eager kiss on his lips. Then she sprang away frightened, sped across the room, and through the opposite door.