But then the Colonel wanted a companion, and was convinced it would be delightful for Cecil; so she prepared to go with well-assumed expressions of pleasure, devoutly hoping that no such contretemps as Bertie wasting any days of his leave by coming in her absence might befall.
To be sure, as she was in correspondence with him, nothing, apparently, was easier than to mention her intended trip, which, of course, would prevent his choosing that time to come to the lake; but it happened that Cecil had written last, and since a certain fatal speech, which even now maddened her to remember, she had been very particularly careful to let him make all the running. Still, not wishing to be left in the dark should he arrive during her absence, she said, carelessly,—"I hope, mamma, you will write now and then, and let us know how you are getting on in this dear little place."
"Really," returned Mrs. Rolleston, smiling, no arrière pensée having struck her,—"I more depend on hearing from you. Bluebell can write her fishing experiences, and how often they have tea on the islands; but all I expect to do is to travel over a good deal of my point-lace flounce before you return."
While Cecil went away to put on her travelling dress, as sometimes happens, the true bearing of the speech flashed on her; and when her step-daughter returned, arrayed en voyageuse, Mrs. Rolleston considerately remarked,—"How dull I shall be without you! I think I'll write to Bertie;" and the quick, grateful glance of intelligence in Cecil's eyes encouraged her to say much more in that letter than she would otherwise have done.
CHAPTER XIX.
CALF LOVE.
I gat my death frae twa sweet een,
Twa lovely een o' bonnie blue;
'Twas not her golden ringlets bright,
Her lips like roses wet wi' dew—
Her graceful bosom lily white—
It was her een sae bonnie blue.
Scotch Song.
The arrival of the Rolleston family created a good deal of interest in the limited society of the lake, and not entirely of a friendly nature. Needless to say, the adolescent members of it were all more or less engaged to each other, which, being rather the result of propinquity than uncontrollable preference, the maidens noticed with angry surprise the admiration excited in the bosoms of their swains by the apparition of Bluebell on their hitherto uninvaded waters. Alec Gough and Bernard Lumley, both morally placarded "engaged," having, as a matter of course, plighted their troth to two neighbouring fledglings, were wild for an introduction; and no sooner did Bluebell's canoe leave Lyndon's Landing, than two corresponding ones were sure to shoot out, apparently actuated by the same persuasion that there was no more likely place for a fish than the snag round which she was trolling, and ready to gaff a maskinonge, or help to land an obdurate bass, if occasion offered.