Page:The Gypsy Lad of Roumania (1914).djvu/5



ICHAEL, the gypsy chief, came out of his hut, his black eyes gleaming with anger.

“Where is that boy Peter?” he shouted. “I will beat him until he knows who is chief here.”

The gypsy children quickly crept into hiding places as they saw the big stick in the chief’s hand. The women, cooking the noonday meal before the doors of their huts or tents, looked down, and stood motionless as he passed. Even the men who were in sight, slipped back into the doorways, or hid behind a tent, until the chief was gone. No one wanted to cross him in his wrath. Up and down the rows of tents he went, without finding the unlucky boy who had aroused so much anger. At length he turned back into his own tent, muttering fiercely about what would happen when he caught Peter.

Meanwhile, the boy himself lay snugly hidden in some bushes at the farther end of the camp. He had no notion of intruding himself upon anyone’s notice just then. He would have plunged into the wood, and gone farther away, but for a reason most important to a healthy, growing