"'Weep not,' said I, 'but spread to me thy fingers, so I may read what fate thou holdest in thy palm.' And like a child she smiled between her tears.
"'Look only on luck,' quoth she, 'oh, ancient one, lest my heart break even now.' I spread her pink fingertips out as one would unruffle a rose, and read therein her fate."
"And what read you there?" said the Black Earl, impatient with her delay.
"I read," quoth the crone, "and if I say, thou must keep thy anger from me, for what I read I had not written:
"I traced upon her slender palm
That luck was changing soon;
I swore that peace would come to her
Before another moon.
"I said that he who loved her well
Would robe her all in silk,
And bear her in a coach of gold,
With palfreys white as milk.
"I told, before three suns had set
He'd kneel down by her side;
That he she loved would love her well,
And she would be his bride.
"'This before three suns have set,' so read I," quoth the crone.
Now, when the Black Earl heard so much, he would hear no more. Pallid grew his angry cheek, and his eyes were full of fire; he flung himself upon his horse, and, sparing not the beast, galloped home.
"In the highest tower shall I lock the jade," quoth he, "lest she bring me shame; for what her palm had writ upon it one must believe, and who dare love her, save I who will not? And should I die, wherefore should she not be another's? And should I not die—but this no man dare, for I shall tear his tongue from his mouth, his ear from his cheek, his heart from his body, ere he speak or listen to a word to my dishonor."