60
FLAMING
YOUTH
Pat nodded. She stared intently at the solaced spot wondering what the progress of the game would be. In Thorpe’s inured mind there was no room for surmise. To him this was all formula, the parliamentary procedure of casual love-making. He drew the yielding fingers into his left hand and slipped his right arm across the slim, girlish shoulders. She leaned back a little from his embrace. ““Well?”? he questioned, an easy laugh on his lips. “Well, what?” she whispered. He bent and kissed her. It was a quick kiss, adventurous and playful. Not so had Warren Graves’s eager and searching lips closed down upon hers. Pat was both disappointed of her expected thrill, and unaccountably relieved and reassured. <A queer, inward fluttering which had unbalanced her thoughts for the moment when the appropriative arm encircled her, was stilled. Suddenly — she felt quite mistress of herself and the situation. She — proceeded now according to a formula which she was improvising, and which millions of girls had improvised before her. “What did you do that for?” she murmured. “Didn’t you want me to?” Pat abandoned her formula before it was fairly under «ay. “I suppose I did,” she admitted. Expectant of the usual “No,” he was startled, amused, and a little roused. ‘Did you?” he said. He drew her closer, bent his mouth to hers again, felt a swift stir at the sweet, soft pressure, followed by a sensible chilling as she turned away to say thoughtfully: “IT wonder why I did.” “You’re a queer kid,” he observed genuinely. “But there’s something mighty sweet about you.” “Is there?” she cried, charmed with the direct flattery.
