"

"Ah, you are a gipsy! Zita has gone back to her own people, then?"

She looked at him in amazed contempt. Apparently, these Christians had
not even manhood enough to be angry when they were insulted.

"What sort of stuff are you made of, that she should stay with you? Our
women may lend themselves to you a bit for a girl's fancy, or if you pay
them well; but the Romany blood comes back to the Romany folk."

The Gadfly's face remained as cold and steady as before.

"Has she gone away with a gipsy camp, or merely to live with your son?"

The woman burst out laughing.

"Do you think of following her and trying to win her back? It's too
late, sir; you should have thought of that before!"

"No; I only want to know the truth, if you will tell it to me."

She shrugged her shoulders; it was hardly worth while to abuse a person
who took it so meekly.

"The truth, then, is that she met my son in the road the day you left
her, and spoke to him in the Romany tongue; and when he saw she was
one of our folk, in spite of her fine clothes, he fell in love with her
bonny face, as OUR men fall in love, and took her to our camp. She told
us all her trouble, and sat crying and sobbing, poor lassie, till our
hearts were sore for her. We comforted her as best we could; and at last
she took off her fine clothes and put on the things our lasses wear, and
gave herself to my son, to be his woman and to have him for her man. He
won't say to her: 'I don't love you,' and: 'I've other things to do.'
When a woman is young, she wants a man; and what sort of man are you,
that you can't even kiss a handsome girl when she puts her arms round
your neck?"

"You said," he interrupted, "that you had brought me a message from
her."

"Yes; I stopped behind when the camp went on, so as to give it. She told
me to say that she has had enough of your folk and their hair-splitting
and their sluggish blood; and that she wants to get back to her own
people and be free. 'Tell him,' she said, 'that I am a woman, and that
I loved him; and that is why I would not be his harlot any longer.' The
lassie was right to come away. There's no harm in a girl getting a bit
of money out of her good looks if she can--that's what good looks are
for; but a Romany lass has nothing to do with LOVING a man of your
race."

The Gadfly stood up.

"Is that all the message?" he said. "Then tell her, please, that I think
she has done right, and that I hope she will be happy