Patience Barlow was kissed by him in secret ways many times before he found another girl.

She and others of the street ran out to play in the snow of a winter's night, or lingered after dusk before her own door when the days grew dark early.

It was so easy to catch and kiss her then, and to talk to her foolishly at parties.

Then came Dora Fitler, when he was sixteen years old and she was fourteen; and Marjorie Stafford, when he was seventeen and she was fifteen.

Dora Fitter was a brunette, and Marjorie Stafford was as fair as the morning, with bright-red cheeks, bluish-gray eyes, and flaxen hair, and as plump as a partridge.
It was at seventeen that he decided to leave school.