"I suppose," said that young lady, with the composure of ignorance, "we are all right as long as this bald-face horse keeps its nose pointing at Captain Delamere's back."
"Quite so," said Jack, cheerily; "don't take the whip, you are only winding it round your own neck. I'll give Dahlia a lick in the face if she turns out of the rank."
They were winding down a hill, and took a road at the bottom at right angles to it. Colonel Rolleston, in the first sleigh, was blandly pointing out to Lady Hampshire the coup d'oeil of the whole procession as they described two sides of a triangle.
"Do you like my plumes?" asked Jack, relaxing his surveillance on Dahlia, as her left ear, which had been laid back in a suggestive manner, resumed its accustomed position.
"Like them," echoed Bluebell; "it's just like a hearse, bar the colour, which is frightful. I wouldn't have come if I had known I was to be driven in such a fire-engine."
"There now," rather crest-fallen. "I chose them because you said you were fond of scarlet, otherwise I should have preferred blue, except that I might have been taken for one of the 10th, who mount their regimental colours on everything."
"I like the 10th," said Bluebell, perversely; "they are all good-looking except the Adjutant, who got his nose sliced off by a Sikh, and the.... goodness what's that?" as a fearful shout, followed by a sudden checking of horses, brought the whole line to a stand-still.
"What's the matter?" was passed from one sleigh to another up to the front: the return message, shouted and taken up as each one interpreted it, became soon about as intelligible as it does in the game of Russian scandal, and for the next few minutes everybody was conjecturing at once.
"Here's Du Meresq," cried Jack, as Bertie came ploughing through the snow.
"Halloa, guard! what's wrong on the line?"