“I--I--thank you, but--I have an engagement,” Jessie faltered, drawing back in secret disgust from her bold admirer. “Well, you may break that engagement, my pretty little Jessie, for I’m bound to have you for my little sweetheart, I swear, and you shall give me a kiss to seal the bargain!” protested Carey Doyle, crowding her to the wall and throwing his arms around her slender waist despite her cries and struggles in his effort to press a kiss on the pouting, scarlet lips. But in the excitement of his entrance they had forgotten to close the door, and Frank Laurier, bounding up the steps, took in directly the situation. The next moment he had wrenched the burly wretch away from Jessie, and thrust him by force down the steps, aiding his progress by a kick as he exclaimed: “Take that for insulting the young lady!” CHAPTER V. THE FIRST KISS. Pale and trembling from her fright, Jessie leaned against the wall when Frank Laurier returned to her, jaunty and debonair, saying lightly: “I have pitched the bold fellow down the steps, and he has gone off out of the way. Why, how pale and ill you look! Were you so much frightened of a kiss?” “Yes--from that wretch!” she faltered, and his deep-blue eyes laughed at her quizzically, and with something like daring in them as he led her out to the pavement to an elegant little trap, and, taking up the reins, drove off in great style for the park. Jessie’s heart throbbed with pride and joy, but she still trembled violently from the struggle with Doyle. She half sobbed: “Oh, I never can thank you enough for driving him away! If he had kissed me--oh, I should have died of disgust!” “Died of a kiss, ha, ha!” laughed the young man gayly, so amused at the idea that it took firm hold of his memory, to be recalled at a fateful aftertime. “Have you never been kissed by a young man, then, little Jessie?” he added, still laughing. “Oh, no, no, never!” blushing deeply. “Then he will be a lucky young fellow who gets the first kiss from you! I wonder who he will be! Can you guess?” The great, dark eyes stole a shy glance at him under the drooping lashes, as she whispered demurely: “Only the man I shall marry!” “Oh, indeed!” Did he think she was chaffing him, or coquettishly daring him, or what? It is certain he was in a reckless, flippant mood, and that swift glance of hers warmed his blood like wine. They were in the park now, driving under the shadow of some autumn-colored trees, and all in a flash his arm slipped round her waist, the brown head bent over the golden one. Two faces bent-- Bent in a swift and daring dream, An ecstasy of trembling bliss, And sealed together in a kiss.