“I suppose that you, Bruce, will go too,” said his father. “For my part, I have seen so many lunar eclipses already, that I shall return to my desk. I want to finish the perusal of that paper sent by my lawyer which I was showing to you when the dinner-gong sounded.”
“I should like to look over the paper with you,” said Bruce. “I do not care to go out to-night.”
The young man was feeling ill, though he did not complain.
“We’ll leave them to their musty-fusty law; as for us, we prefer meditation and moonlight!” said Vibert playfully, as a few minutes afterwards he stood in the hall with Emmie, assisting his sister to mantle her slight form in her fur-lined mantilla. “I don’t see why papa should bother himself with Bullen and his horrible dyes; the stream is clear enough where it flows through our woods. If Bullen had poisoned our coffee, or killed our trout, the matter might have required a lawyer. There now, just let me throw this pretty little scarlet shawl over your head, to be a complete defence against the night air! I declare that it makes you look like an opening rose-bud; I never saw a headdress more picturesque and becoming!”
Emmie smiled, and the brother and sister quitted the house together, sauntering down the steps which led from the door to the carriage-drive.
“We can see nothing here,” observed Vibert; “we must go right round to the back of the house, and make our way over the lawn, till we get just beyond the group of yew-trees. There we shall have a clear view of the moon.”
The first touch of shadow was dimming the round disc of the moon when the brother and sister stepped forth on the snow. But the orb was hidden from them, first by the house, and then by the trees around it, until they should reach the spot indicated by Vibert. The short quick walk was not a silent one; Vibert’s thoughts were engrossed by a subject much more interesting to him than the moon.
“Emmie, I must be off to London to-morrow,” said he.
“To London!” echoed Emmie in surprise. “What has put such a sudden flight into your mind?”
“I’ve many reasons for wishing to go up to town. Patti is to sing to-morrow night at a grand concert; I am dying to hear her again, and Standish—kind fellow!—has given me a ticket of admittance. Then I’ve shopping and business to transact which I cannot possibly put off. I shall only stay for one night in London, and I will not go to a hotel. Aunt Mary told me, you know, that she could always offer me a room in Grosvenor Square.”