“I’m not so very keen about it myself,” said Cora dubiously, for as those familiar with her previous adventures will remember, her experiences with these picturesque vagabonds had not been devoid of unpleasantness and danger. “But I’ll see what Jack says about it, and if he thinks we have time, I won’t mind stopping.”
She hailed Jack, and, after consulting his watch, the latter agreed that they could easily spare a half-hour or so for a visit to the gypsy camp.
They drew their cars to the side of the road and picked their way through the woods to the little dell where the gypsy encampment lay.
It was a typical camp of those strange nomads in whose blood runs the “call of the wild,” and who in their mode of life are almost as far removed from other human beings as though they lived upon another planet.
There were perhaps a dozen vans, from which came strange smells of cooking, amid which onion and garlic predominated. Unkempt children in tattered clothing played with dogs that seemed to be legion, while wrinkled and slatternly women sat on the steps of the vans or made their way through the grounds, whining their requests to visitors to cross their palms with silver and learn in return all that pertained to their present and future. Swarthy men, some of them with huge ear-rings and with sashes and turbans that reminded one of the pirates of tradition, lay sprawled out on the grass watching the throng with eyes that were sometimes indifferent and again sullen and smoldering.
There were just two elements that redeemed the camp from its general aspect of squalor and forlornness. One was the fine horses that were scattered here and there, for the gypsy has the keenest eye for a good animal of any trader on earth. The other was the presence of several gypsy girls of a wild barbaric type of beauty, whose flashing eyes and gaudy trinkets contrasted with the prevailing ugliness of their surroundings.
There were a large number of visitors present, due to the proximity of a large town a mile or so away, through which the automobiles had passed just before reaching the camp.
“Here’s the place to have your future told,” said Jack.
“Lucky they can’t tell our past,” remarked Walter. “What a give-away that would be for some of us.”
“I hope you haven’t any deep dark secret that would ‘chill the young blood, harrow up our souls’ if it were told,” laughed Cora.