“George—George! do come here!” exclaimed the young lady, as her brother passed; “I want you!”
“What’s all this about?” said the guardsman, lounging up. “My dear Clara, the way you do get the steam up at a moment’s notice is perfectly astonishing. What can I do for you?”
“Do you want to have your fortune told?”
“If any good sibyl would predict for me a rich wife, who would pay my debts, and keep me provided with kid gloves and cigars, I wouldn’t object; but in any other case—”
His speech was cut short by the sudden appearance of the footman with the gipsy queen, of whom he seemed considerably afraid. And truly not without reason; for a lioness in her lair might have looked about as safe an animal as the dark, fierce-eyed gipsy queen. Even the two young men started; and Miss Clara Jernyngham stifled a little scream behind her fan.
“I wish to see Earl De Courcy,” was her abrupt demand.
“And we wish our fortune told, good mother,” said Lord Villiers; “my father will attend to you presently.”
“Your father!” said the woman, fixing her piercing eyes on his handsome face, “then you are Lord Villiers?”
“You have guessed it. What has the future in store for me?”
“Nothing good for your father’s son,” she hissed through her clenched teeth. “Give me your hand.”