"Zingra! What a pretty name!" whispered Nellie to her brother. "I wonder if she likes sweeties," she said aloud, "because if she does she shall have some of mine." She opened her packet of caramels as she spoke, and the gipsy child turned from the horse to watch her. "Hold out your hand, please, Zingra!"
Zingra obeyed, her rosy lips parting in a smile which revealed two rows of pearly teeth, and Nellie placed three caramels in her tiny brown palm. At that minute the gipsy woman came up, and seeing what Nellie had done, exclaimed: "There, now, Zingra, isn't that kind of the pretty little lady? What do you say?"
"T'ank-oo," lisped Zingra, who was already skinning the thin paper from one of her caramels.
Meanwhile Tom had read the name painted on the side of the caravan, and learnt that the gipsy man was called Moses Lee, and that he was a licensed hawker. He asked him where he was going, and was told that it was to Hatwell Green, a piece of waste ground by the roadside, rather more than a mile from Chilaton. It was the gipsies' intention to encamp there for a few weeks whilst they traded in the town and district.
Mrs. Lee, having been to the doors of all the houses in Ladysmith Terrace, now seated herself with her little daughter on one of the steps at the back of the caravan, and her husband, having relieved Bob of his nosebag, perched himself on the shaft once more, and drove on, slowly as before. Whilst Nellie and Tom stood looking after the caravan, the former exchanging waves of the hand with Zingra, a motor-horn sounded in the road behind them, and looking round they recognised Miss Perry's car. As it passed them Tom shot one swift glance at its occupants, and it seemed to him that Peter deliberately turned his face away as he did so.
"I hate that boy!" he exclaimed passionately; "I shall hate him as long as I live!"
"Why?" questioned Nellie. "You may as well tell me," she added coaxingly; "do, Tom!"
"Well, perhaps I will by and by, but it must be a secret, mind."
"Very well."
Later in the day, Nellie, whose curiosity had now been thoroughly aroused, succeeded in prevailing upon Tom to give her his confidence. When she had learnt his cause for grievance against Peter Perry she was quite as indignant as he was himself.