None but the closest observer, and one, too, on the watch for signs, could have detected the slightest variation of expression on the woman's face. To all appearance, she was entirely unconscious of the presence of the holiday party; but her quick ears had caught very distinctly every word uttered by Seth, and her quick sense, sharpened from her birth to certain ends conducive to the earning of sixpences in an unlawful way, had already placed a construction upon them which might lead to profit. Without raising her eyes, she noted the composition of the party, and waited for the course of events to bring her into action. Seth's soothing tone quieted the Duchess's fears, and his words excited Sally to a most wonderful degree. She had never seen a real gipsy; she had heard of them and of their occult powers of divination, and now one was before her, endowed with the mysterious and awful power of prophecy and of seeing into the future. The opportunity was too precious to be lost. She clasped her hands, and with a beseeching look at Seth, cried: "O Daddy! ask her to tell the Duchess's fortune." "Nonsense, Sally," said Seth. "She can no more tell fortunes than you or I can. Why, one of your trances is a hundred times better than anything she can tell us. Besides, what is to be is to be." He spoke in a low tone, and the gipsy lost not a word of his speech. Sally was not given to dispute with her guardian. She loved and respected him too well, believing that he knew better than anybody else in the world what was good for everybody; but she had to struggle with herself for strength to bear the disappointment. The next few steps brought them to the side of the gipsy, who rose and confronted them. "Let me tell your fortune, pretty lady." Sally's heart beat quickly as the gipsy took her hand and held it with light, firm grasp. "We have no time for fortune-telling," said Seth, adding gently, "and no money." "Sixpence won't harm you, kind gentleman," said the gipsy, sitting on a hillock, so that her face and Sally's were on a level. "You haven't come all the way from London to spoil the pleasure of these little ladies for sixpence." "Oh, oh!" cried Sally, palpitating. "She knows we come from London!" "The gipsy woman knows everything, and sees everything, pretty lady." The circumstance of being called pretty lady in so winsome a voice was honey to Sally's soul. Seeing no way but one out of the difficulty, Seth gave the woman a sixpenny-piece, which she, suspicious of the tricks of Londoners of a common grade, placed between her teeth to test. Sally meanwhile, having an arm disengaged, clasped the Duchess's waist, and drew her close to her side. The gipsy cast a rapid glance upon the two children, noting the tenderness expressed in the action, and then fell to examining Sally's hand. "You see the usual things in it, of course," said Seth, with but small respect in his tone for the woman's art. "What usual things?" asked the gipsy.