"Tripod and kettle," I said. "Do you remember this ancient dame?"
"Yes," said Letitia, "it is—"
"Sibyl," I said. "Her name is Sibyl."
Letitia smiled.
"Do you remember me?" she asked, offering her hand. The old witch peered cunningly into her face, grinning and nodding as if in answer. Two or three scraggy, evil-eyed vagabonds were currying horses and idling about the camp, watching us, but at a glance from the fortune-teller, they slouched streamward. The crone's entreaties and my own were of no avail. Letitia put her hands behind her—but we saw the vans and patted the horses and crossed the woman's palm so that she followed us, beaming and babbling, to the carriage-side. There we were scarcely seated when, stepping forward—so suddenly that I glanced, startled, towards the camp—the gypsy laid a brown hand, strong as a man's, upon the reins; and turning then upon Letitia with a look so grim and mysterious that she grew quite pale beneath those tragic eyes, muttered a jargon of which we made out nothing but the words:
"You are going on a long journey," at which the woman stopped, and taking a backward step, stood there silently and without a smile, gazing upon us till we were gone.
Letitia laughed uneasily as we drove away.
"Did she really remember you?" I asked.
"No, I don't think so—which makes it the more surprising."
"Surprising?"