He thought: Now I can certainly kiss her. He was, nevertheless, terribly afraid; he had never before kissed a girl of good family, and he wondered if it might not be dangerous. Her father was lying asleep in a hammock a little way off, and he was the mayor of the town.
She thought: Perhaps it will be still better if I give him a box on the ear when he kisses me.
And she thought again: Why doesn’t he kiss me? Am I so ugly and disagreeable?
She leaned forward over the water to see her reflection, but her image was broken by the splashing of the water.
She thought again: I wonder how it will feel when he kisses me. As a matter of fact she had only been kissed once, by a lieutenant after a ball at the town hotel. He had smelt so abominably of punch and cigars that she had felt but little flattered, although to be sure he was a lieutenant, but otherwise she had not much cared for the kiss. Furthermore she hated him because he had not been attentive to her afterwards or indeed shown any interest in her at all.
While they sat so, each engrossed in private thoughts, the sun went down and it grew dark.
And he thought: Seeing that she is still sitting with me, though the sun is gone and it has become dark, it may be that she wouldn’t so much object to my kissing her.
Then he laid his arm softly around her neck.
She had not expected this at all. She had imagined he would merely kiss her and nothing more, and with that she would give him a box on the ear and go off like a princess. Now she didn’t know what she should do; she wanted of course to be angry with him, but at the same time she didn’t want to lose the kiss. She therefore sat quite still.
Thereupon he kissed her.