He was not smiling, or if he had been for one moment, the impulse died of itself the next. Educated as he had been, hemmed in by conventionalities, it was impossible not to be startled by the wildness, the depth of feeling revealed by this strange child. The very reckless innocence with which she exposed every sensation as it arose in her heart—the intensity of feeling thus betrayed made him thoughtful, nay, anxious. It was only for a brief time, however. Before Aurora could notice his abstraction it had disappeared.
“Is it, indeed, love for me, Aurora, that makes you so happy?” he questioned with fond egotism.
“I do not know; to-night I scarcely know myself. Love! it has a soft, sweet sound—but does not mean enough. Oh, if you could speak Rommany now, in our language are such words; oh, how insipid your word love is when compared to them.”
In a deep, passionate voice, the very tones of which seemed to thrill and burn into the heart, she uttered some words in pure Rommany, that language which has yet been traced to no given origin. Like ourselves, it is an outcast, vagabond dialect, which baffles investigation.
He understood nothing of what she said. But her eyes so dazzlingly brilliant; her lips kindled to a vivid red, as it were, by the burning words that passed through them; the exquisite modulations of each tone, all had a powerful effect upon the young man—powerful, but not that which might have been expected, for it filled his mind with distrust.
She did not heed the change in his countenance. Juliet herself was never more thoroughly inspired or more trusting. Crafty in all things else, our women are single-hearted as children in their love. Truth itself is not more constant. Religion does not give you a trust more perfect—religion—love is a religion to them, they have no better, poor, wandering creatures, bereft of all things, home, name, nationality, faith. But all people must have something that they deem holy, something upon which the soul can lean for strength and comfort. Happier nations put faith in a God, we poor outcasts have only our household affections, and we keep them sacred as your altars.
Though the gipsy adopts the faith of any nation that gives him protection, becomes Catholic, Protestant, Mohammedan, Idolater, as the case may be, it is all a pretence. In his soul he loathes the object that he craftily seems to worship.
But the Englishman knew nothing of this. He had no idea of the rigid bonds with which antique custom hedges in the domestic affections in a gipsy household. These affections are the most sacred thing known to us. I have said that as a people we have no other religion.
With all this ignorance of our customs, how could he comprehend a creature like that, with her unreserve, her passion so vivid, that it struggled constantly for some new medium of expression, and grew impatient of the stately Spanish, and the few English words that seemed to chill every impulse as she strove to frame it into utterance. He could not believe that a woman trained to deception, wild, unchecked, nay, taught to believe the right wrong, was in everything that related to her own womanly tenderness true as gold—honest as infancy.
He shrunk from this poor child then, as her own language gushed up and swept the cold Spanish from her lips. It seemed to him that she must have uttered those words before; perhaps to some traveller-dupe like himself; perhaps to Chaleco—Chaleco. He began to dwell upon that name with jealous eagerness, and coupled it with the words of Rommany that still trembled on Aurora’s lips. For the first time he began to doubt the poor gipsy girl; yet I, who know the women of his own people to the soul, say to you most solemnly, that among the best of his fair compatriots he might have searched a life-time, and in vain, for a young heart so pure in every loving impulse, so thoroughly virtuous as that which beat within the velvet bodice of the little Gitana.