"
"Really, Angel! Why didn't you tell me before? Where was it, then? In
the street, or where?"
"No, it was much stranger than that," said Angel. "Do you believe the
future can be foretold to us?"
"Oh, it was in a dream, you funny Angel; was that it?" said Henry,
whose rationalism at this period was the chief danger to his
imagination.
"No, not a dream. Something stranger than that."
"Oh, well, I give it up."
"It was like this," Angel continued; "there's a strange old gipsy woman
who lives near us--"
"Oh, I see, your hand--palmistry," said Henry, with a touch of gentle
impatience.
"Henry, dear, I said you would laugh at me. I won't tell you now, if
you're going to take it in that spirit."
Henry promptly locked up his reason for the moment, with apologies, and
professed himself open to conviction.
"Well, mother sometimes helps this poor old woman, and, one day, when
she happened to call, Alice and Edith and I were in the kitchen helping
mother. 'God bless you, lady,' she said,--you know how they
talk,--'you've got a kind heart; and how are all the young ladies? It's
time, I'm thinking, they had their fortunes told.
Pages:
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183