She faltered a despairing negative; and one of the girls exclaimed, curiously:
"Do tell us what she said, Miss Chase! It can not possibly be worse than what she promised us!"
"Yes, tell us all about it, so that we can laugh at it together!" added Love solicitously, seeing how unnerved she was, anxious to turn it all into a joke.
Dainty leaned heavily on her lover, as though scarcely able to stand, and her eyes turned mournfully to his while she faltered, fearfully:
"Oh, I shall never forget how balefully her black eyes burned on me through the holes in her mask, as if she hated me, and what cruel glee rang in her voice as she hissed in my ear: 'You do well to choose lilies for your adorning, for they are funeral flowers, and you will soon be the bride of Death!'"
And with those faltered words, the frightened girl dropped like a broken flower and hung fainting on her lover's arm.
Instantly there was a great commotion, the girls rushing hither and thither for restoratives, so that Dainty soon sighed and opened her blue eyes in pathetic wonder.
"Love," she murmured, weakly; and one of the girls said, pityingly:
"There, dear; don't worry. Mr. Ellsworth has gone into the tent to scold the old fortune-teller for telling you such wicked falsehoods."
"Just as she told all of us," added another. "Why, I never saw such a spiteful old hag in my life, promising me a drunken, abusive husband, when I am engaged to the dearest fellow in the world!"