Page:Leah Reed--Brenda's summer at Rockley.djvu/194

178 be let alone. They can carry on their horse-trading and their fortune-telling better if they keep themselves to  themselves.”

Fortune-telling! Brenda reflected for a moment. She remembered that a year or two before, one summer afternoon, the cook and the housemaid had seemed much excited by  the appearance of an old gypsy woman with a basket on  her arm. They had welcomed her as if expecting her, and Brenda had seen her seated in a corner of the laundry when,  a little later, she followed the gypsy to see what was  happening. But although on her entrance the girls and the gypsy seemed to be merely engaged in bargaining  about the baskets, Brenda knew that the whispering and  laughing meant something more. Mary, the cook, after the gypsy’s departure, would grant her no more satisfaction  than to say that they had been having their fortunes told,  and that in consequence she expected a pot of money soon,  and a trip to the old country.

Her interest had not been lessened by the fact that she had not heard of Mary’s receiving any large sum of money. It is true, that she had taken a trip to the old country, permission for which Mrs. Barlow had given rather grudgingly. It is also true that at the end of her vacation she had announced that she was engaged to a fine lad who was coming out to be married in a year or two. But as he had not yet appeared, Brenda did not know whether or not Mary had  still kept her faith in the power of the fortune-teller.

Of one thing, however, Brenda was certain, and that was that if ever she had the chance she would have her fortune