“Don’t talk nonsense,” reproved Helen.
We went into the fortune-telling tent. It was full of people, screaming and laughing. A real gipsy with a swarthy skin and black flowing locks was telling fortunes. Helen had hers told when she could make a place, and was promised a lord for a husband, and five-and-thirty grandchildren. At which the tent roared again, and Helen laughed too.
“And now it is your turn, my pretty little maid,” said the sibyl to Anna Whitney. And Anna, always modest and gentle, turned as red as a rose, and said she already knew as much of her own fortune as she desired to know at present.
“What’s in this hand?” cried the gipsy, suddenly seizing upon Tod’s big one, and devouring its lines with her eyes. “Nay, master; don’t draw it away, for there’s matter here, and to spare. You are not afraid, are you?”
“Not of you, my gipsy queen,” gallantly answered Tod, resigning his palm to her. “Pray let my fate be as good as you can.”
“It is a smooth hand,” she went on, never lifting her gaze. “Very smooth. You’ll not have many of the cares and crosses of life. Nevertheless, I see that you have been in some peril lately. And I should say it was connected with money. Debt.”
There were not many things could bring the colour to Joseph Todhetley’s face; but it matched then the scarlet mantle the gipsy wore slung over her right shoulder. You might have heard a pin drop in the sudden hush. Anna’s blue eyes were glancing shyly up through their long lashes.
“Peril of debt, or—perhaps—of—steeple-chasing,” continued the sibyl with deliberation; and at that the shouts of laughter broke out again through the tent, and Anna smiled. “Take you care of yourself, sir; for I perceive you will run into other perils before you settle down. You have neither caution nor foresight.”
“That’s true enough, I believe,” said Tod. “Any more?”
“No more. For you are just one of those imprudent mortals who will never heed a friendly warning. Were I you, I’d keep out of the world till I grew older.”