"No," said Cecil, faintly, as her head drooped unconsciously on Cos's shoulder. She had struck her forehead on the ice, which had stunned her slightly. The Colonel saw the chestnut hair resting against Cos's arm; he dropped the hand he had taken, and turned to the shore.
"Bring her to the bank," he said, briefly. "I will go home and send a carriage. Good Heavens! that that fool should have saved her!" I heard him mutter, as he brushed past me.
He drove the carriage down himself, and under pretext of holding on the horses, did not descend from the box while Horace wrapped rugs and cloaks round Cecil, who, having more pluck than strength, declared she was quite well now, but nearly fainted when Horace lifted her out, and she was consigned by Mrs. Vivian to her bedroom for the rest of the day.
"It is astonishing how we miss Cecil," remarked Blanche, at dinner. "Isn't it dull without her, Sydney?"
"I didn't perceive it," said the Colonel, calmly; "but I am very sorry for the cause of her absence."
"Well, by Jove! it sounds unfeeling; but I can't say I am," murmured Horace. "It's something to have saved such a deuced pretty girl as that."
"Curse that puppy," muttered Syd to his champagne glass. "A fool that isn't fit for her to look at——"
Syd's and my room, in the bachelors' wing, adjoin each other; and as our windows both possess the convenience of balconies, we generally smoke in them, and hold a little chat before turning in. When I stepped out into my balcony that night, Syd was already puffing away at his pipe. Perhaps his Cavendish was unusually good, for he did not seem greatly inclined to talk, but leant over the balcony, looking out into the clear frosty night, with the winter stars shining on the wide white uplands and the leafless glittering trees.
"What's that?" said he sharply, as the notes of a cornet playing, and playing badly, Halévy's air, "Quand de la Nuit," struck on the night air.
"A serenade, I suppose."