"Gracious, no! that would be quite out of your way! Go to--I'll tell you what, Bluebell shall show you where you turn off--it isn't ten minutes from here."
Bertie murmured a profusion of thanks, and, distrustful of Miss Opie, protested against being so troublesome. But Bluebell, scarce able to believe in such luck, sprang up with a sudden illumination of countenance, and the next minute the lovers were alone under the light of the moon.
"Bluebell," said Du Meresq, "I have got a sleigh here. I thought I _might_ get you out of it if I pretended I was walking, and didn't know the way; but the fact is, my child, I can hardly limp a hundred yards. Come a little drive with me."
"Oh! I dare not. It is so late, and they expect me back again directly."
"Then you are going to run away the first moment we have been alone for so long!"
"Whose fault is that," said she, reproachfully.
"Not mine. I have been laid up ten days with a broken ankle. But I suppose you have been seeing Jack Vavasour every day, and forgotten all about me?"
"Bertie," said Bluebell, hesitatingly, "did they say anything to you about--"
"About Jack? Yes, they said he was spoons on you. And also, Miss Bluebell, that you were awfully in love with him."
"No, no, nonsense," said she, blushing. "I meant about yourself."
"They know nothing of that?" said he, inquiringly.
"They do, though. I don't know what you will say, Bertie, but I told Mrs. Rolleston."
"What can you mean, Bluebell? Bella told me that you cared for nobody but Jack Vavasour; and I was deuced angry, I can tell you; at first, though I thought it uncommon 'cute of you saying so."
Bluebell, utterly confounded by this extraordinary assertion, had no time to reply, for she found herself close to a covered sleigh, and the man had got down and opened the door. She drew back.
"What do you propose?" said he, in an angry whisper. "We can't sit out in the snow, and I can't walk another yard."
She hesitated, and he gently impelled her into the vehicle, following himself, to the anguish of his injured foot, that he had struck in his haste.
"Where to, sir?" said the man, whom Bertie, in his momentary pain, had forgotten.
"Can't, sir. I am ordered at the College by six o'clock."