"Good man! It's mutual. You can have the kiss if you want it, just for liking."
"But you'd rather I wouldn't."
"And that's very shrewd of you. You're right; I like you that much ... Cary, I don't wonder Pat's batty over you."
"Pat? You're quite wrong."
"And I'm wrong in thinking you're crazy about her, I suppose."
"Equally."
"Pat's line," remarked the astute Miss Parmenter thoughtfully, "is the Minnesota shift up to date; all tomboy, you're-another, take-it-or-leave-it one minute, and the next you know she's a clinging vine and you're it. She can do it with those wonderful eyes and that throaty, croaky, heart-breaky voice of hers. It knocks the boys cold. And I'd think it would be just the line to catch an old—a man of the world like——"
"An old man like you, you started to say," prompted Scott. "No occasion for embarrassment on my account."
"Don't fool yourself by thinking that age makes such a difference to girls, these days. They think it does at Pat's age, but a couple of years more makes a big diff. Most of the boys I used to be crazy about look like sapheads to me now. They're too easy. There's more pep in experience; and," remarked the youthful philosopher, "the bigger they are, the harder they fall. Pat's a pretty wise kid, at that. She isn't all 'petite gamine.'"