As soon as Deborah came out of college she made fresh literary attempts; she was not successful. Now, frequent and continuous failures are depressing, but they usually have the good effect of weeding out the unfit and leaving only the strong. However, she was beginning to feel dispirited. She had tried tragedy, comedy, mixtures, satires, ghost stories, and myths, and everything had failed and been returned. Each rejection had come like a dull thump on the top of her heart, but none perhaps for some years had had quite the same dispiriting effect as the first. Still she had hoped that when once out of college, and with more time to give to writing, she would manage better; but that was not so, the failures still continued. When she had been in the country about a year she went to London for a week’s holiday. Susan was there and they had a very enjoyable time. “Do you know, I have a most irresistible longing to have my fortune told,” Deborah said one day during this holiday. “It has been growing on me for some time.” “I thought you didn’t believe in that kind of thing,” remarked Susan. “No, I don’t. But I want to try to find out something. Will you come?” “Oh, yes,” Susan answered; she rather liked the idea. There was a nurse staying in the same house who believed implicitly in such things, and she furnished them with the name and address of a woman who, according to her accounts, had much fame as a truthful fortune-teller. It was a hot Friday afternoon when they went, and the next day Deborah was returning to the country. The woman had a fine face and a pleasing manner. She first of all told Susan’s hand—and she really did contrive to tell it marvellously well. She told her a great deal too, and all that she said was true. By this time it was getting very dark, and there was every appearance of a thunder-storm—the heat all day had been intense. When she came to read Deborah’s hand she had exhausted her supply of words. But after a while she said,— “You are unfair in your prejudices. You take strong likes and dislikes without any good foundation for them.” “There now,” said Susan. “That is you to a ‘T,’ Deborah.” After that the lady was some time casting about in her mind as to what she should say next, till suddenly Susan queried,— “Has she any particular gift for writing?” That rather startled Deborah; she had not expected it, although it was the one thing and the only thing she wanted to know. The fortune-teller looked very minutely at both hands and then declared very decidedly,— “No. There is not the slightest indication of any gift that way—not in the slightest.” There was a short silence, during which Deborah had the most curious feeling of baffled anger she had ever felt in her life. “I told you so,” said a voice in her ear far plainer than any human voice. “How many times do you want telling? You may be quite sure if this woman saw the least signs of anything that way she would tell you at once.”