“A sovereign will not buy good news unless it is true, pretty lady; and the gipsy’s words are true. I was going to tell you, though you have no son, you will have many fair daughters, who will live and grow up and marry and bear many fine sons, who will grow up and be great men in the land.”
“This is foretelling the long future with a notable blessing!” laughed Anna. “But I wish you had promised these fine sons to me instead of to my future daughters. I don’t care anything about those very shadowy young ladies. I don’t know them.”
The gipsy turned to Dick, and with her musical whine pleaded:
“Kind, handsome gentleman, do cross the poor gipsy wife’s hand with a little, little bit of silver, for telling all about your wife’s daughters and daughters’ sons, who will be rulers in the land beyond the sea.”
“How do you know that lady is my wife?” inquired Dick, much astonished.
“Ah! good gentleman, can the gipsy know the future and not know the present? Now, kind, handsome gentleman, give the poor gipsy a bit of silver for good luck—the poor gipsy, sweet gentleman! who sees such great, good fortune for you, and none at all for herself!”
“Then she is no true seeress, or she would see this piece of good fortune coming to her,” said Dick, as in the largeness of his heart and the extravagance of his habits he put into the gipsy’s hands the great American gold coin, the double eagle, worth nearly five sovereigns.
The gipsy had never seen such a coin in her life. It inspired her, and for once she broke into something like poetry.
“Ah, noble gentleman! you have made the poor gipsy rich and happy. Ah! kind gentleman, may the stars rain down blessings on your head as bright as their own beams! May flowers spring up under your footsteps wherever you tread! May——”
“Dick!” laughed Anna, breaking into the discourse and cutting short the rhapsody, “I shall lend you out to some of our old neighbors to walk their barren gardens into bloom!”