“Men who flirt are no better than city clerks who kiss their best girls under the mistletoe at suburban tea-parties,” said Angela, elevating her little pointed chin.
“Now, I like that kind of young man,” said Ella: “besides, they don’t exist. She won’t talk like this when she’s married, will she, Maud?”
“I never shall marry,” Angela asseverated. “To decline a proposal is bad enough, but to accept one—horrible!”
“Don’t see where the horrors come in,” murmured Maud, placidly. “I suppose my sensibilities aren’t fine enough. I’ve always enjoyed it.”
“I dislike the ceremony of kissing,” said Angela, throwing down the gauntlet.
“It isn’t a ceremony, it’s one of the rites of women,” said Ella, dissolving into laughter.
Angela laughed too. She was in earnest, but not to the extent of becoming a bore. “I believe in the rights of women,” she said. “Don’t you agree with me, Miss Fane?”
“About kissing?” said Dolly, “I don’t think it matters much; a kiss means nothing.”
Angela looked rather horrified; Maud Prideaux smiled behind her fan; Mrs. Merton was frankly interested. “What a lovely original idea!” she said. “All the three-volume novels used to end with the first kiss. Lord Arthur saw sanctified snakes, and Lady Imogen felt the tide of love bearing her away and her hair came down. And in girls’ stories it’s the bell that rings down the curtain on the sacred scene. And you don’t believe in it?”
“No,” said Dolly, speaking in her swift, straightforward way. “A kiss is a touch and nothing more, neither pleasant nor the reverse. What I should dislike would be to be kissed against my will.”