"When the dance was ended, the gipsies went over to a corner of the field where a feast was being prepared. Great fires had been kindled. Huge kettles of rice were boiling there, and whole sheep were being roasted. "Many of the young gipsies were handsome. Their eyes were dark and sparkling, and their teeth were of a pearly white. But the old women were wrinkled and ugly. Their long, thin fingers made me think of witches." "The gipsies dress in the old style of our country, don't they, papa?" "Yes, you always see them with large, baggy trousers, short jackets, and turbans wound around their heads. The men wear bright-coloured waistbands, stuck full of pistols and daggers." "I feel scared, papa, only to hear you speak of such things." "How foolish that is, Osman. The gipsies would do you no harm. They mind their own affairs pretty well. To be sure, we do not love these people, but there is nothing to fear from them. "They have chosen to live among us, and, although they go away in large companies and travel all over Europe, they are sure to come back here." "Where did they come from in the first place, papa?" "A long time ago, I believe, they lived in the far East, or in Egypt. They speak a queer language, made up of Hindi and Greek, as well as Turkish words." Just then, Osman's mother came into the room. "Father has just been telling me about a feast held by the gipsies this afternoon, mamma." "Indeed! And did any of the women offer to tell you your fortune?" asked the lady, as she turned toward her husband. "They were having too good a time among themselves to notice any outsider," he answered. "At any other time I should have been bothered by them. I can't tell you how many times this year I have been asked to show the palm of my hand and cross it with silver." "The silver is the pay for the fortune-telling, isn't it?" asked Osman. [Illustration: "'SHE TOLD ME HE WOULD BE MY HUSBAND.'"] "Certainly; a gipsy wouldn't give you a moment of her time unless she were paid for it," said his mother. "When I was a young girl, I loved to have my fortune told. One day a beautiful young gipsy girl came to the door of my house. Of course, she asked to tell my fortune. "I spread out the palm of my hand and she looked at it a long time with her bright black eyes. She seemed to study the lines as though she were reading. At last, she began to speak slowly in a low voice. And, would you believe it! she described your father, Osman, although I had never seen him at that time. She told me he would be my husband." Osman's father smiled a little and then said, "The less we have to do with these strange people, my son, the better. It is very easy for these fortune-tellers to make one or two guesses that afterward turn out to be true. But we have talked enough about the gipsies for one day. Let us speak of something else."