For certain reasons he decided not to discuss this last invention with Snorky Green. These tentative efforts were but exercising his imagination. He knew it and waited breathlessly.
But at last, a month after the failure of the Foot-Regulator, the long-awaited thrill arrived, the thrill which comes only with the possession of a Universal Idea, and for the first time in his long, untroubled fifteen years, it arrived in conjunction with the intrusion into his still simple scheme of things of that arch-disturber—woman.
Miss Virginia Dabtree was not destined to occupy the proud place of the first love, though Miss Dabtree (who was Snorky Green's aunt) was eminently equipped for such a position, being eighteen years his senior and at an age when by instinct, habit, and a need of self-encouragement, any tribute from the opposite sex, no matter how given, caused her not the slightest irritation.
Skippy, however, was too completely dazzled by the consummate artistry of Miss Dabtree's clinging toilettes, the built-up luxuriousness of her hair, the pink and white complexion, the stenciled eyebrows, and the Lady Vere de Vere attitudes to dare to entertain a personal hope.
He was dazzled, dumfounded! A new world opened to him. Through her at last he perceived woman, her place in the now more complex scheme of things, the influence she could exert, the stimulus to the imagination, and the answer to his need of some guiding purpose.
True, Miss Dabtree's age was her protection. She was removed from even the flights of his imagination, yet the influence she exerted all unwittingly over his life was inestimable. For it was for her, to protect her, that he, Skippy Bedelle, conceived his magnum opus, the Mosquito-Proof Socks.
The hour was eight, the day Sunday, the time the first clear week in June. They sat together on the porch of the Kennedy, listening to the sound of the Upper House singing rising clearly above the twang of banjos across the campus from the esplanade.
The long twilight had set in, yet the afterglow hung brilliantly about them. Skippy was balanced gingerly on the front edge of a rocker which swayed perilously under him and added to his general discomfort. There was a safe straight-backed stationary chair only ten feet away, but to save his life he could think of no legitimate excuse for rising and possessing it. If he leaned back the sharp upright collar, borrowed from Dennis de Brian de Boru Finnegan, cut cruelly into his chin, and when he craned forward the red choker tie (restored by Snorky in addition to the agate cuff buttons) bulged forth in the most disconcerting and unimpressive luxuriance.
"You've known Snorky, that is, Arthur, a long time, haven't you?" he said desperately, breathing hard.