"Surely there never was so lucky a fellow. Here I am kept warm and happy by the two finest girls in town."
"Yes," said Lottie; "and it"s a shame you can"t sit on both sides of us."
"I a.s.sure you I wish it were possible. It would double my pleasure."
"I"m very well content," remarked Carrie, quietly, "as long as I can keep on the right side of people--"
"Well, you are not on the right side to-night," interrupted Lottie.
"Good gracious!" thought Marstern, "she"s next to my heart. I wonder if that will give her unfair advantage;" but Carrie explained:
"Of course I was speaking metaphorically."
"In that aspect of the case it would be a shame to me if any side I have is not right toward those who have so honored me," he hastened to say.
"Oh, Carrie has all the advantage--she is next to your heart."
"Would you like to exchange places?" was the query flashed back by Carrie.
"Oh, no, I"m quite as content as you are."
"Why, then, since I am more than content--exultant, indeed--it appears that we all start from excellent premises to reach a happy conclusion of our Christmas Eve," cried Marstern.
"Now you are talking shop, Mr. Lawyer--Premises and Conclusions, indeed!" said Lottie; "since you are such a happy sandwich, you must be a tongue sandwich, and be very entertaining."
He did his best, the two girls seconding his efforts so genially that he found himself, after driving five miles, psychologically just where he was physically--between them, as near to one in his thoughts and preferences as to the other.
"Let us take the river road home," suggested Lottie.
"As long as you agree," he answered, "you both are sovereign potentates. If you should express conflicting wishes, I should have to stop here in the road till one abdicated in favor of the other, or we all froze."
"But you, sitting so snugly between us, would not freeze," said Lottie.
"If we were obstinate we should have to a.s.sume our pleasantest expressions, and then you could eventually take us home as bits of sculpture. In fact, I"m getting cold already."
"Are you also, Miss Carrie?"
"Oh, I"ll thaw out before summer. Don"t mind me."
"Well, then, mind me," resumed Lottie. "See how white and smooth the river looks. Why can"t we drive home on the ice? It will save miles--I mean it looks so inviting."
"Oh, dear!" cried Carrie, "I feel like protesting now. The longest way round may be both the shortest and safest way home."
"You ladies shall decide. This morning I drove over the route we would take to-night, and I should not fear to take a ton of coal over it."
"A comparison suggesting warmth and a grate-fire. I vote for the river," said Lottie, promptly.
"Oh, well, Mr. Marstern, if you"ve been over the ice so recently--I only wish to feel reasonably safe."
"I declare!" thought Marstern, "Lottie is the braver and more brilliant girl; and the fact that she is not inclined to forego the comfort of the home-fire for the pleasure of my company, reveals the difficulty of, and therefore incentive to, the suit I may decide to enter upon before New Year"s."
Meanwhile, his heart on Carrie"s side began to grow warm and alert, as if recognizing an affinity to some object not far off. Granting that she had not been so brilliant as Lottie, she had been eminently companionable in a more quiet way. If there had not been such bursts of enthusiasm at the beginning of the drive, her enjoyment appeared to have more staying powers. He liked her none the less that her eyes were often turned toward the stars or the dark silhouettes of the leafless trees against the snow. She did not keep saying, "Ah, how lovely! What a fine bit that is!" but he had only to follow her eyes to see something worth looking at.
"A proof that Miss Carrie also is not so preoccupied with the pleasure of my company that she has no thoughts for other things," cogitated Marstern. "It"s rather in her favor that she prefers Nature to a grate fire. They"re about even yet."
Meanwhile the horse was speeding along on the white, hard expanse of the river, skirting the west sh.o.r.e. They now had only about a mile to drive before striking land again; and the scene was so beautiful with the great dim outlines of the mountains before them that both the girls suggested that they should go leisurely for a time.
"We shouldn"t hastily and carelessly pa.s.s such a picture as that, any more than one would if a fine copy of it were hung in a gallery," said Carrie. "The stars are so brilliant along the brow of that highland yonder that they form a dia--oh, oh! what IS the matter?" and she clung to Marstern"s arm.
The horse was breaking through the ice.
"Whoa!" said Marstern, firmly. Even as he spoke, Lottie was out of the sleigh and running back on the ice, crying and wringing her hands.
"We shall be drowned," she almost screamed hysterically.
"Mr. Marstern, what SHALL we do? Can"t we turn around and go back the way we came?"
"Miss Carrie, will you do what I ask? Will you believe me when I say that I do not think you are in any danger?"
"Yes, I"ll do my best," she replied, catching her breath. She grew calm rapidly as he tried to rea.s.sure Lottie, telling her that water from the rising of the tide had overflowed the main ice and that thin ice had formed over it, also that the river at the most was only two or three feet deep at that point. But all was of no avail; Lottie stood out upon the ice in a panic, declaring that he never should have brought them into such danger, and that he must turn around at once and go back as they came.
"But, Miss Waldo, the tide is rising, and we may find wet places returning. Besides, it would bring us home very late. Now, Miss Carrie and I will drive slowly across this place and then return for you.
After we have been across it twice you surely won"t fear."
"I won"t be left alone; suppose you two should break through and disappear, what would become of ME?"
"You would be better off than we," he replied, laughing.
"I think it"s horrid of you to laugh. Oh, I"m so cold and frightened! I feel as if the ice were giving way under my feet."
"Why, Miss Lottie, we just drove over that spot where you stand. Here, Miss Carrie shall stay with you while I drive back and forth alone."
"Then if you were drowned we"d both be left alone to freeze to death."
"I pledge you my word you shall be by that grate-fire within less than an hour if you will trust me five minutes."
"Oh, well, if you will risk your life and ours too; but Carrie must stay with me."
"Will YOU trust me, Miss Carrie, and help me out of this sc.r.a.pe?"
Carrie was recovering from her panic, and replied, "I have given you my promise."
He was out of the sleigh instantly, and the thin ice broke with him also. "I must carry you a short distance," he said. "I cannot allow you to get your feet wet. Put one arm around my neck, so; now please obey as you promised."
She did so without a word, and he bore her beyond the water, inwardly exulting and blessing that thin ice. His decision was coming with the pa.s.sing seconds; indeed, it had come. Returning to the sleigh he drove slowly forward, his horse making a terrible crunching and splashing, Lottie meanwhile keeping up a staccato accompaniment of little shrieks.
"Ah, my charming creature," he thought, "with you it was only, "What will become of ME?" I might not have found out until it was too late the relative importance of "me" in the universe had we not struck this bad crossing; and one comes to plenty of bad places to cross in a lifetime."
The area of thin ice was not very narrow, and he was becoming but a dim and shadowy outline to the girls. Lottie was now screaming for his return. Having crossed the overflowed s.p.a.ce and absolutely a.s.sured himself that there was no danger, he returned more rapidly and found Carrie trying to calm her companion.