‘It is more likely that she is making fun of them,’ said Alice. ‘Is she a gipsy? She has the appearance of one.’
‘What is a gipsy?’ I asked.
‘A person who belongs to a strange wandering tribe; whether there are more tribes than one I do not know. They are to be found everywhere, I believe. They look like Jews, but they are not Jews. It is supposed that they originally came from Egypt or India. I used to take a great interest in reading about them. I never can pronounce the word gipsy without an English country picture rising before me; a wayside tract of grass off a dusty road, clumps of trees here and there, the trickling sound of a little brook mingled with the humming of bees and the lowing of cattle in a near pasture, a waggon covered with canvas, two or three dark-skinned little children playing on the grass, a tawny woman like that creature there, bending over an iron pot dangling above a gipsy fire, a fierce, bushy-whiskered, chocolate-faced man, mending chairs, or making baskets, or tinkering at a little forge.’
She gazed at me earnestly when she ceased to speak. I knew that she sought in the expression of my face for some sign of my recognition of the picture she had drawn, for some hint of recollection in my looks. A sudden burst of laughter broke from the people gathered about the gipsy.
‘I believe she is telling fortunes,’ said Alice; ‘shall we go and listen to her, dear?’
She took my arm and we approached the crowd. It was as Alice had said: the woman was telling fortunes. She was holding the delicate white fingers of the elder Miss Glanville, whose handsome face was rosy red. Everybody was on the broad grin. The gipsy woman holding the girl’s fingers talked with her eyes upon the palm of the hand, but sometimes she would flash a look into Miss Glanville’s face. The creature spoke deliberately, with a slow drawling whine. She seemed to heartily enjoy her task, and to be in no hurry to proceed with her business of divination. Her face was heavy, the features strong and coarse, and the whole head would have better suited a man’s than a woman’s figure; yet the countenance was not wanting in a certain wild comeliness. The nose was of the true Egyptian pattern as we are taught to understand the meaning of the word Egyptian by ancient chiselling and inscriptions, and her hair, or as much as was visible of it, resembled a wig manufactured from a horse’s tail.
‘He will make you unhappy,’ she was saying in her drawling whining voice, ‘but you will be true to him. Yet you will not be sorry when he dies, and a handsome man will be your second. But he will have to wait for you, and cheerfully will he wait for you, my lady, for he’s waiting for you now. True love is never in a ’urry.’ There was a laugh. ‘He will not bring you money. No, it is your ladyship that will set him up; but he’ll never be made to feel his want of money, for your ’art beats fond.’
‘What stuff!’ said Alice.
‘It makes her blush, yet she does not look displeased,’ I whispered.
‘Can’t you name the two fortunate gentlemen, mother?’ exclaimed a tall, slender young man known to me as simply Mr. Stinton.