to have
parted at that fence, Dutton; the horse took it well enough!' Then I have
no 'hands,' I am told. Certainly, whenever I take up the rudder-lines to
put his head for any particular course the brute takes it as a personal
affront, and begins to fret, go sideways, and bore and all but tell me
what a duffer he thinks me. There's my cousin Kate, who will spoon with
me by the hour in a greenhouse, and dance as often as I like to ask her,
but at the cover-side she is so ashamed of me she shuns me like the
plague; and then, of course, next ball it is, 'Dear Harry, _do_ introduce
me to Major Rattletrap,' or some such soldier officer, 'I like the look
of him _so_ much.'--'I just offered to,' says I, 'but he didn't seem to
rise; said his card was full. Seems sweet on that girl in pink, with
black eyes.' That's a school friend of Kate's, whom she is mortal jealous
of."

"As if she believed a word of it!"

"Oh, didn't she, though! She bit her lip, and looked shut up. I have
great moral influence over Kate that way."

"There's a grand iceberg!" cried Bluebell, after an amused pause, in
which she had been trying to picture Cousin Kate: "What a strange shape;
it must be hundreds of feet high. How cold it makes the air, though."

"And you are shivering; I'll run and fetch another rug. It is warmer by
the funnel, only there are a lot of fellows smoking there."

"But, Mr. Dutton," said she, hesitatingly, "why don't you join them? You
have given me all your warm things, and must be cold yourself."

"I'll go if you tell me to," said the lieutenant, looking full into
Bluebell's eyes. She was silent, and the long eye-lashes came into play
while she considered. She had promised Mrs. Rolleston not to flirt, but
there had been no question of that hitherto. Why should she throw away a
little pleasant companionship when she was so lonely? "I only spoke on
your account." But she had flirting eyes, which said, only too plainly,
"Go, if you can."

"I don't think any one could feel cold near you," he whispered,--and
then they both blushed. A minute after he ran off for the rug, and
Bluebell was left--to repent. "Oh, dear!" thought she, with very hot
cheeks, "we must _not_ begin this sort of thing already, or there will be
an end to all comfort--and as if I could ever forget!"

She received the rug with matter-of-course indifference, and looked up
at him with the serenity of a nun; the young lieutenant was quick to
perceive the change.