"It is an Hungarian song, and means that while the stream flows I hear the violin of my love. Kara taught me the ditty."
"And Kara is your love?"
"No. Oh, no; oh, no," sang Chaldea, whirling round and round in quite a magical manner. "No rom have I, but a mateless bird I wander. Still I hear the violin of my true love, my new love, who knows my droms, and that means my habits, rye," she ended, suddenly speaking in a natural manner.
"I don't hear the violin, however," said Lambert lazily, and thinking what a picturesque girl she was in her many-hued rag-tag garments, and with the golden coins glittering in her black hair.
"You will, rye, you will," she said confidentially. "Come, my darling gentleman, cross my hand with silver and I dance. I swear it. No hokkeny baro will you behold when the wind pipes for me."
"Hokkeny baro."
"A great swindle, my wise sir. Hai, what a pity you cannot patter the gentle Romany tongue. Kek! Kek! What does it matter, when you speak Gentile gibberish like an angel. Sit, rye, and I dance for you."
"Quite like Carmen and Don José in the opera," murmured Lambert, sliding down to the foot of the rude stone.
"What of her and of him? Were they Romans?"
"Carmen was and José wasn't. She danced herself into his heart."