"You mustn't waste another moment of this beautiful moonlight."
As Ruth and Armitage passed out of the rectory they were welcomed by shouts from the bobsled.
Then Mr. Warren, who drove, clucked to the pony. But the runners of the sled had stuck, so that when it did start forward it was with a violent jerk, and everybody nearly fell off backward.
Later, it seemed, everybody did fall off.
Prospect Hill that night was "fast" to begin with, and as sleds traveled down it, it got faster. There is a turn half-way down the hill, and Mr. Warren made a mistake in steering, and his whole party, locked tightly in each other's arms and legs, were thrown off sideways into soft snow.
Nobody was hurt except Ruth. And she told only Armitage that she was hurt.
"It's nothing," she said. "Just my back—just a little twist. Don't say a word to the others and spoil their fun."
And she wouldn't let him say a word to the others, and she went right on coasting down the hill and walking back up it as if nothing was the matter, and she laughed and shrieked just as the other women did, and was altogether brave and admirable.
But she allowed Armitage to gather that the
