When Leo’s turn came, he bravely made his choice of Paula and nearly spoiled the show by reverently bending and kissing the hem of her gown.
“It will never do,” Ernestine told him. “It must be a real kiss. Put up your lips to be kissed.”
“Let the last be first and kiss me, Leo,” Lute begged, to save him from his embarrassment.
He looked his gratitude, put up his lips, but without enough tilt of his head, so that he received the water from Lute’s hat down the back of his neck.
“All three shall kiss me and thus shall paradise be thrice multiplied,” was Terrence’s way out of the difficulty; and simultaneously he received three crowns of water for his gallantry.
Dick’s boisterousness waxed apace. His was the most care-free seeming in the world as he measured Froelig and Martinez against the door to settle the dispute that had arisen as to whether Froelig or Martinez was the taller.
“Knees straight and together, heads back,” Dick commanded.
And as their heads touched the wood, from the other side came a rousing thump that jarred them. The door swung open, revealing Ernestine with a padded gong-stick in either hand.
Dick, a high-heeled satin slipper in his hand, was under a sheet with Terrence, teaching him “Brother Bob I’m bobbed” to the uproarious joy of the others, when the Masons and Watsons and all their Wickenberg following entered upon the scene.
Whereupon Dick insisted that the young men of their party receive the kiss of welcome. Nor did he miss, in the hubbub of a dozen persons meeting as many more, Lottie Mason’s: “Oh, good evening, Mr. Graham. I thought you had gone.”