The girl paused at the gate. "Then we needn't hurry," she suggested, smiling.
"We needn't delay," he countered amiably. "If somebody doesn't interrupt 'em before long, George will be too late to get the pitcher filled. This town shuts up tight at midnight, Saturdays—if you want to believe everything you hear. So there's no need of being too indulgent with our infatuated fellow-inmates."
"But—just a minute, Mr. Sybarite," she insisted.
"As many as you wish," he laughed. "As a matter of fact, I loathe draught beer."
"Do be serious," she begged. "I want to thank you."
He was aware of a proffered hand, slender and fine in a shabby glove; and took it in his own, uneasily conscious of a curious disturbance in his bosom, of a strange and not unpleasant sense of commingled expectancy, pleasure, and diffidence (as far as he was able to analyse it—or cared to—at that instant).
"It was kind of you to come," he said jerkily, in his embarrassment.
"I enjoyed every moment," she said warmly. "But that wasn't all I meant when I thanked you."
His eyebrows climbed with surprise.
"What else, Miss Lessing?"