"Yes, ma'am--but she looks such a tinkler."

"Cease that chatter, blockhead! and do my bidding."

Again Sam vanished; and mystery, animation, expectation rose to full

flow once more.

"She's ready now," said the footman, as he reappeared. "She wishes

to know who will be her first visitor."

"I think I had better just look in upon her before any of the ladies

go," said Colonel Dent.

"Tell her, Sam, a gentleman is coming."

Sam went and returned.

"She says, sir, that she'll have no gentlemen; they need not trouble

themselves to come near her; nor," he added, with difficulty

suppressing a titter, "any ladies either, except the young, and

single."

"By Jove, she has taste!" exclaimed Henry Lynn.

Miss Ingram rose solemnly: "I go first," she said, in a tone which

might have befitted the leader of a forlorn hope, mounting a breach

in the van of his men.

"Oh, my best! oh, my dearest! pause--reflect!" was her mama's cry;

but she swept past her in stately silence, passed through the door

which Colonel Dent held open, and we heard her enter the library.

A comparative silence ensued. Lady Ingram thought it "le cas" to

wring her hands: which she did accordingly. Miss Mary declared she

felt, for her part, she never dared venture. Amy and Louisa Eshton

tittered under their breath, and looked a little frightened.

The minutes passed very slowly: fifteen were counted before the

library-door again opened. Miss Ingram returned to us through the

arch.

Would she laugh? Would she take it as a joke? All eyes met her

with a glance of eager curiosity, and she met all eyes with one of

rebuff and coldness; she looked neither flurried nor merry: she

walked stiffly to her seat, and took it in silence.

"Well, Blanche?" said Lord Ingram.

"What did she say, sister?" asked Mary.

"What did you think? How do you feel?--Is she a real fortune-

teller?" demanded the Misses Eshton.

"Now, now, good people," returned Miss Ingram, "don't press upon me.

Really your organs of wonder and credulity are easily excited: you

seem, by the importance of you all--my good mama included--ascribe

to this matter, absolutely to believe we have a genuine witch in the

house, who is in close alliance with the old gentleman. I have seen

a gipsy vagabond; she has practised in hackneyed fashion the science

of palmistry and told me what such people usually tell. My whim is

gratified; and now I think Mr. Eshton will do well to put the hag in

the stocks to-morrow morning, as he threatened."




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