She flushed slightly.
“I’m—I’m just telling my fortune, William,” she said.
“Oh,” said William. He was impressed.
“It does sometimes come true,” she said eagerly, “I do it nearly every day. It’s curious—how it grows on one.”
She began to turn up the covered cards and study them intently. William sat on a chair opposite her and watched with interest.
“There was a letter in my cards yesterday,” she said, “and it came this morning. Sometimes it comes true like that, but often,” she sighed, “it doesn’t.”
“Wot’s in it to-day?” said William, scowling at the cards.
“A death,” said Miss Tabitha in a sepulchral whisper, “and a letter from a dark man and jealousy of a fair woman and a present from across the sea and legal business and a legacy—but they’re none of them the sort of thing that comes true. I don’t know though,” she went on dreamily, “the Income Tax man might be dark—I don’t know—and I may hear from him soon. It’s wonderful really—I mean that any of it should come out. It’s quite an absorbing pursuit. Shall I do yours?”
“’Um,” said William graciously.
“You must wish first.”