enough, Kate Stephens was by way of being engaged to Ned Bancroft; but already it was plain that she was in love with Smith, and my outspoken admiration of Smith helped her, I hope, as I am sure it helped him, to a better mutual understanding. Bancroft accepted the situation with extraordinary self-sacrifice, losing neither Smith's nor Kate's friendship: I have seldom seen nobler self-abnegation; indeed, his high-mindedness in this crisis was what first won my admiration and showed me his other fine qualities. Almost in the beginning I had serious disquietude: every little while Smith was ill and had to keep his bed for a day or two. There was no explanation of this illness, which puzzled me and caused me a certain anxiety. One day in midwinter there was a new development. Smith was in doubt how to act and confided in me. He had found Professor Kellogg, in whose house he lived, trying to kiss the pretty help, Rose, entirely against her will. Smith was emphatic on this point: the girl was struggling angrily to free herself, when by chance he interrupted them. I relieved Smith's solemn gravity a little by roaring with laughter. The idea of an old professor and clergyman trying to win a girl by force filled me with amusement: «What a fool the man must be!» was my English judgment; Smith took the American high moral tone at first.
«Think of his disloyalty to his wife in the same house,» he cried, «and then the scandal if the girl talked, and she is sure to talk!» «Sure not to talk,» I corrected. «Girls are afraid of the effect of such revelations; besides a word from you asking her to shield Mrs. Kellogg will ensure her silence.» «Oh, I cannot advise her,» cried Smith. «I will not be mixed up in it: I told Kellogg at the time, I must leave the house, yet I don't know where to go! It's too disgraceful of him! His wife is really a dear woman!»
For the first time I became conscious of a rooted difference between Smith and myself: his high moral condemnation on very insufficient data seemed to me childish, but no doubt many of my readers will think my tolerance a proof of my shameless libertinism!
However, I jumped at the opportunity of talking to Rose on such a scabrous matter and at the same time solved Smith's difficulty by proposing that he should come and take room and board with the Gregorys-a great stroke of practical diplomacy on my part, or so it appeared to me; for thereby I did the Gregorys, Smith and myself an immense, an incalculable service. Smith jumped at the idea, asked me to see about it at once and let him know, and then rang for Rose.
She came half-scared, half-angry, on the defensive, I could see; so I spoke first, smiling. «Oh Rose,» I said, «Professor Smith has been telling me of your trouble; but you ought not to be angry: for you are so pretty that no wonder a man wants to kiss you; you must blame your lovely eyes and mouth.» Rose laughed outright: she had come expecting reproof and found sweet flattery. «There's only one thing, Rose,» I went on. «The story would hurt Mrs. Kellogg if it got out and she's not very strong, so you must say nothing about it, for her sake. That's what Professor Smith wanted to say to you.» I added. «I'm not likely to tell,» cried Rose. «I'll soon forget all about it, but I guess I'd better get another job: he's liable to try again, though I gave him a good, hard slap,» and she laughed merrily. «I'm so glad for Mrs. Kellogg's sake,» said Smith gravely, «and if I can help you get another place, please call upon me.» «I guess I'll have no difficulty,» answered Rose flippantly, with a shade of dislike of the professor's solemnity. «Mrs. Kellogg will give me a good character,» and the healthy young minx grinned,
«besides I'm not sure but I'll go stay home a spell. I'm fed up with working and would like a holiday, and mother wants me-» «Where do you live, Rose?» I asked with a keen eye for future opportunities.
«On the other side of the river,» she replied, «next door to Elder Conklin's, where your brother boards,» she added smiling.
When Rose went I begged Smith to pack his boxes, for I would get him the best room at the Gregorys' and assured him it was really large and comfortable and would hold all his books, etc.; and off I went to make my promise good. On the way, I set myself to think how I could turn the kindness I was doing the Gregorys to the advantage of my love. I decided to make Kate a partner in the good deed, or at least a herald of the good news. So when I got home I rang the bell in my room, and as I had hoped Kate answered it. When I heard her footsteps I was shaking, hot with desire, and now I wish to describe a feeling I then began to notice in myself. I longed to take possession of the girl, so to speak, abruptly, ravish her in fact, or at least thrust both hands up her dress at once and feel her bottom and sex altogether; but already I knew enough to realize certainly that girls prefer gentle and courteous approaches. Why? Of the fact I am sure. So I said, «Come in, Kate,» gravely. «I want to ask you whether the best bedroom is still free, and if you'd like Professor Smith to have it, if I could get him to come here?» «I'm sure, Mother would be delighted,» she exclaimed. «You see,» I went on, «I'm trying to serve you all I can, yet you don't even kiss me of your own accord.»
She smiled, and so I drew her to the bed and lifted her up on it. I saw her glance and answered it: «The door is shut, dear,» and half lying on her, I began kissing her passionately, while my hands went up her clothes to her sex. To my delight she wore no drawers, but at first she kept her legs tight together frowning. «Love denies nothing, Kate,» I said gravely; slowly she drew her legs apart, half-pouting, half-smiling, and let me caress her sex. When her love-juice came, I kissed her and stopped. «It's dangerous here,» I said, «that door you came in is open; but I must see your lovely limbs,» and I turned up her dress. I hadn't exaggerated; she had limbs like a Greek statue and her triangle of brown hair lay in little silky curls on her belly and then-the sweetest cunny in the world. I bent down and kissed it.
In a moment Kate was on her feet, smoothing her dress down. «What a boy you are,» she exclaimed, «but that's partly why I love you; oh, I hope you'll love me half as much. Say you will, Sir, and I'll do anything you wish!» «I will,» I replied, «but oh, I'm glad you want love; can you come to me tonight? I want a couple of hours with you uninterrupted.» «This afternoon,» she said, «I'll say I'm going for a walk and I'll come to you, dear! They are all resting then or out and I shan't be missed.» I could only wait and think. One thing was fixed in me, I must have her, make her mine before Smith came: he was altogether too fascinating, I thought, to be trusted with such a pretty girl; but I was afraid she would bleed and I did not want to hurt her this first time, so I went out and bought a syringe and a pot of cold cream which I put beside my bed. Oh, how that dinner lagged! Mrs. Gregory thanked me warmly for my kindness to them all (which seemed to me pleasantly ironical!) and Mr. Gregory followed her lead; but at length everyone had finished and I went to my room to prepare. First I locked the outside door and drew down the blinds: then I studied the bed and turned it back and arranged a towel along the edge; happily the bed was just about the right height! Then I loosened my trousers, unbuttoned the front and pulled up my shirt: a little later Kate put her lovely face in at the door and slipped inside. I shot the bolt and began kissing her; girls are strange mortals; she had taken off her corset, just as I had put a towel handy. I lifted up her clothes and touched her sex, caressing it gently while kissing her: in a moment or two her love-milk came.
I lifted her up on the bed, pushed down my trousers, anointed my prick with the cream and then, parting her legs and getting her to pull her knees up, I drew her bottom to the edge of the bed: she frowned at that, but I explained quickly: «It may give a little pain, at first, dear: and I want to give you as little as possible,» and I slipped the head of my cock gently, slowly into her. Even greased, her pussy was very tight and at the very entrance I felt the obstacle, her maidenhead, in the way; I lay on her and kissed her and let her or Mother Nature help me. As soon as Kate found that I was leaving it to her, she pushed forward boldly and the obstacle yielded. «O-O!» she cried, and then pushed forward again roughly and my organ went in her to the hilt and her clitoris must have felt my belly. Resolutely, I refrained from thrusting or withdrawing for a minute or two and then drew out slowly to her lips and, as I pushed Tommy gently in again, she leaned up and kissed me passionately. Slowly, with extremest care, I governed myself and pushed in and out with long slow thrusts, though I longed, longed to plunge it in hard and quicken the strokes as much as possible; but I knew from Mrs. Mayhew that the long, gentle thrusts and slow withdrawals were the aptest to excite a woman's passion and I was determined to win Kate. In two or three minutes, she had again let down a flow of love-juice, or so I believed, and I kept right on with the love-game, knowing that the first experience is never forgotten by a girl and resolved to keep on to dinnertime if necessary to make her first love-joust ever memorable to her. Kate lasted longer than Mrs. Mayhew; I came ever so many times, passing ever more slowly from orgasm to orgasm before she began to move to me; but at length her breath began to get shorter and shorter and she held me to her violently, moving her pussy the while up and down harshly against my man-root. Suddenly she relaxed and fell back: there was no hysteria; but plainly I could feel the mouth of her womb fasten on my cock as if to suck it. That excited me fiercely and for the first time I indulged in quick, hard thrusts till a spasm of intensest pleasure shook me and my seed spirted or seemed to spurt for the sixth or seventh tune. When I had finished kissing and praising my lovely partner and drew away, I was horrified; the bed was a sheet of blood and some had gone on my pants: Kate's thighs and legs even were all incarnadined, making the lovely ivory white of her skin, one red. You may imagine how softly I used towel on her legs and sex before I showed her the results of our love-passage. To my astonishment she was unaffected. «You must take the sheet away and burn it,» she said, «or drop it in the river: I guess it won't be the first.» «Did it hurt much?» I
