Laura Belding was as quick to think as she was to act. She remained
perfectly calm after the woman's question--calm outwardly, at least. Now
she spoke:
"You have spoken a very true thing now. If I had seen such a girl I
should not tell you. And this has nothing to do with my own fortune. I
have paid you to tell me something about my future--which you seem to
know so well."
This spurring phrase put the woman on her mettle. She flushed slowly
under her dark skin.
"You are a heretic--you do not believe," she said.
"I must be shown before I believe," returned Laura, confidently.
"Then what comes to you in the future will only prove the case," laughed
the Gypsy queen. "You do not believe in palmistry," and she tossed the
hand from her lightly.
"Neither do you," said Laura, bluntly. "You did not hold my hand then to
enable you to read my palm, but for another purpose."
"You are a shrewd lady," said the Gypsy. "I read character in other ways
than by palmistry--it is true."
She looked at Laura for some seconds very earnestly. Of course, Mother
Wit did not believe this Gypsy had any occult power; but her deep black
eyes were wonderfully compelling, and it might be that there was
something in "mind reading."
"You have an intention now that, if followed to its conclusion, will
bring you trouble, young lady. Just what that intention may be, or what
trouble it may bring, I cannot say exactly," declared the woman, slowly
and impressively. "But it deals with a person you have never seen but
once--I believe, recently. It seems that you may think you are helping
her----"
"That is not prophesying," said Laura, quickly, and interrupting the
Gypsy queen. "I shall scarcely think your information worth what I have
paid you if you do not do better than that."
"What do you mean?" demanded the woman, hastily, and with a flush coming
into her cheek again.
"You know very well that you are warning me not to assist the girl who
has run away from this camp," Mother Wit said, boldly.
"Ha! Then you _did_ see her?" cried the Gypsy.
"You know I did. You played a trick on me to find out. You are not
telling my fortune, but you are endeavoring to find out, through me,
about the girl who has run away. And I tell you right now, you will not
learn anything further from me--or from the other girls."
The Gypsy queen gazed at her with lowering brows; but Laura Belding
neither "shivered nor shook."
"You are quite courageous--for a girl," observed the woman, at last.
"I may be, or not. But I am intelligent enough to know when I am being
fooled. Unless you have something of importance to tell me I shall
conclude that this fortune-telling seance is ended," and Laura rose from
her seat.
"Wait," said the woman, in a low voice. "I will tell you one thing. You
may not consider it worth your attention now, little lady; but it will
prove so in the end. _Do not cross the Romany folk--it is bad luck!_"
"And I do not believe in 'luck,'" rejoined Laura, smiling. She was
determined not to let the woman see that she was at all frightened.
Surely these people would not dare detain, or injure, seven girls.
"An unbeliever!" muttered the Gypsy woman. "We can tell nothing to an
unbeliever."
"And having got _from_ her all you are likely to get," said Laura,
coolly, "your prophecies are ended, are they?"
Queen Grace waved her hand toward the tent flap. "Send in one of your
companions," she said. "Any one of them. I am angry with you, and when
passion controls me I can see nothing, little lady."
But Laura Belding went forth, fully determined that none of her friends
should waste their money upon the chance that the Gypsy queen might see
into the future for them.
"It's wicked, anyway," decided Mother Wit. "If God thought it best for
us to know what the future had in store for us, he would have put it
within the power of every person to know what was coming. Professional
palmists, and fortune-tellers of all sorts, are merely wicked persons
who wish to get foolish people's money!"
She found the six other girls grouped in the middle of the camp, trying
to understand one of the women, who was talking to them, and evidently
not a little frightened.
"Oh, Laura! How did it go?" demanded Jess, running to her.
"Very bad. She is a fraud," whispered Mother Wit. "And look out! they
think we have seen the girl who ran away and they will try to pump us
about her."
"That's what I thought," declared Jess.
"Know all about your past and future, Laura?" asked Bobby Hargrew.
"Dear me! it makes me shiver to think of it," said Nellie. "Does she
stir a cauldron, and call on the spirits of the earth and air?"
"She calls on nothing but her own shrewd sense," replied Laura, shortly.
"And she can tell you really nothing. Take my advice, girls, and don't
try it."
"Oh!" cried the disappointed Bobby "I did so hope she could tell
me--more."
"Don't you believe a thing she told you about trouble coming to you at
school," said Eve, quietly.
"You needn't worry about that, Bobs," drawled Dora Lockwood. "You know
you are always getting into trouble with Gee Gee."
"Maybe she could tell me how to circumvent her," sighed Bobby.
"You'll never get the best of Miss Grace Carrington," said Jess,
decidedly; "so give up all hope of _that_."
"Let the little lady try it--do," whined one of the women. "She can
learn much, perhaps. Because one fails, that is no reason why another
should not succeed."
"I'd like to try it," said Bobby, earnestly.
Laura whispered: "What they want to find out is if we saw the girl who
has run away from them, and if we know where she is. Be careful."
"Are you sure?"
"Positive," Laura replied. "She caught me with her questions. She knows
I saw the girl. I told her nothing else."
The queen came to the opening of the tent and beckoned to Bobby. She
seemed to know instinctively which girl was anxious to try her arts.
"Oh, Bobby," whispered Dorothy. "Maybe you'd better not--as Laura says."
"I want to see for myself," said the other girl, doggedly.
And she moved toward the Gypsy's tent. Laura gathered the other girls
about her. One of the women was so near that she could overhear anything
said louder than a whisper.
"I want to get away from here at once," said Laura, quietly. "Let us buy
any little things they may have for sale, and go on our way. We can get
away better now when there are only two men in the camp than we can when
those other three--and the bloodhound--get back."
"Oh, mercy me!" gasped Jess. "I had forgotten about the bloodhound."
"Hush!" murmured Laura. "Don't let that woman hear you."
But it was evident that the Gypsy woman had heard. She uttered a
sentence or two in Romany and the two men whom the girls had seen before
at the camp appeared. They did not come near, but sat by the roadside
that passed through the hollow, and filled their pipes and smoked. It
was quite evident that they were on guard.
"We are prisoners!" whispered Nellie, seizing Eve's arm.
"Sh!" admonished Laura again. "Don't let them see that you're afraid.
That will only make them the bolder."
But all of the six girls outside the Gypsy's tent were more than a
little disturbed. The situation did seem serious.