I laughed, and saw my gaiety reflected in her eyes an instant.
Then, of a sudden, she put one arm around my neck and rested her lips on mine. And so I kissed her, and she suffered it, resting so against me with lowered eyes.
The flower-sweetness of her mouth bewildered me, and I was confused by it and by the stifled tumult of my heart, so that I scarce had sense enough to detain her when she drew away.
She sat at my side, the faint smile still stamped on her lips, but her brown eyes seemed a little frightened, and her breast rose and fell like a scared bird's under the snowy kerchief.
"Well—and well," says she in her pretty, breathless way—"I am overpaid, I think, and you are now acquitted of your debt. And so—and so our folly ends ... and now is finally ended."
She took her sewing. A golden light was in the room; and she seemed to me the loveliest thing I had ever looked upon. I realized it. I knew she was loveliest of all. And the swift knowledge seemed to choke me.
After a little while she stole a look at me, met my eyes, laughed guiltily.
"You!" said she, "a schoolmaster! You teach me one thing and would have me practice another. What confidence can I entertain for such wisdom as is yours, John Drogue?"
"Rules," said I, "are made to be proven by their more interesting exceptions. However, in future you are to endure no kiss and no caress—unless from me."
"Oh. Is that the new lesson I am to learn and understand?"