“Simplest thing in the world! Be back in a second to show you how. Nothing like it! Absolutely—” but he was carried beyond his hearers, whose eyes followed his wild evolutions with more or less apprehension for “what next?” since it seemed contrary to all laws of gravitation for any human being to maintain his equilibrium very long if he took such chances.
“He has turned! He’s coming back! Now watch out, Hadyn, and learn how it’s done,” laughed Constance, as this skated “Ichabod Crane” bore down upon them, hair blown on end, arms flying, legs cutting capers legs never before had cut, and upon his face the expression of “do or die, man, for she is watching you.”
“Gee, what a swathe he cuts!” cried another man, as the light snow lying upon the ice flew from beneath the rushing skates.
“Now watch out! Clear the track! Look sharp, and you’ll all catch the knack of it without half trying. Nothing easier,” shouted the skater as he drew nearer, pride in his eyes, glory descending upon him. But alack! it’s said ’a haughty spirit goeth before a fall.’ There may have been an ice fissure. Forbes insisted there was one in which he caught his skate; but there certainly was the fall both actual and figurative. As the enthusiast came within ten feet of his spellbound audience, a pair of very long legs came up, and a very loosely-hung body came down with dispatch. The legs flew apart until the figure resembled an ice-boat under full headway, nor did its momentum perceptibly lessen as it sped past its audience, the light snow piling up in front of it and flying over its shoulders as it flies back from a snow-plow. For fully thirty feet the wild figure slid along before it lost its impetus. Then it came to a dazed stop. Only one of the audience was prepared to go to its aid; the others were entirely helpless, and were hanging upon each other’s necks—let us hope in tears of sympathy.
“Can—can I help you?” stammered Hadyn, as he bent over to raise the prone one. “You—you rather came a cropper that time, and—and—”
“Get behind me, for heaven’s sake. Do you think a man can slither along on the ice for thirty feet and—and not damage his garments? Quick, before all those people get wise. Is your long cape in the boathouse? Yes? Thanks, I’ll take it, and I don’t care a hang if you freeze;” and scrambling to his feet Forbes sped for the boathouse, and the world saw him not again that day.
Scarcely had Forbes left the party on the pond when a new member was added to it, or, at least, arrived upon the scene with a very firmly fixed intention of being added to it if he could contrive to be.
He was arrayed, from his standpoint of a proper toilet for the occasion, in a costume altogether irresistible, and which it had cost him no little time and outlay to procure.
Heavy tan shoes, a plaided Scotch tweed suit, a sweater of gorgeous red, and a sealskin cap.
With many a curve and flourish, for the man could skate, he came up to the group, and with a most impressive bow to Constance, raised the fur cap, and, standing uncovered, said: