“Yes, I do,” she said at last.
With a sudden resistless sweep he clasped her in his arms and kissed her lips.
Her heart leaped in mad response to the first kiss a lover had ever given. Her body quivered and relaxed in his embrace. It was sweet—it was wonderful beyond words.
He kissed her again, and she clung to him, lifting her eyes to his at last in a long, wondering gaze and then pressed her own lips to his.
“Oh, my God, Kiddo, you love me! It beats the world, don't it? Love at first sight for both of us! I've heard about it, but I didn't think it would ever happen to me like this—did you?”
She shook her head and bit her lips as the tears slowly dimmed her eyes.
“It takes my breath,” she murmured. “I can't realize what it all means. It seems too wonderful to be true.”
“And you won't turn me down because I don't know who my father and mother was?”
“No—my heart goes out to you in a great pity for your lonely, wretched boyhood.”
“I couldn't help that—now could I?”