approaching the table and gazing at her with
undisguised admiration.

"You should have come before. How can you study my methods when I am not
practicing them? And any way, you have no faith in them. Have you? I
always had until I heard your sermon in the little meeting house."

"And have you lost it now?"

"It has been sadly shaken."

"You can at least show me how you practice the art, even if you have
lost your faith in it. I too have lost a faith; but we must live. What
are these cards for?"

"If you wish me to show you, you may shuffle and cut them, but I would
rather tell your fortune by your hand, for I have more faith in
palmistry than in cards."

He extended his hand; she took it, and with her right forefinger began
to trace the lines. Her gaze had that intensity with which a little
child peers into the mechanism of a watch or an astronomer into the
depths of space.

A thrill of emotion shot through the frame of the Quaker at the touch of
those delicate and beautiful fingers.

The contrast between his own hands and hers was marked enough to be
almost ridiculous. Hers were tiny, soft and white. His were large, brown
and calloused. He thought to himself, "It is as if two little white
mice were playing about an enormous trap which in a moment may seize
them."

Neither of them, spoke. The delicate finger of the gypsy moved over the
lines of the palm like that of a little school-girl over the pages of a
primer. They did not realize how dangerous was that proximity, nor how
fatal that touch. Through those two poles of Nature's most powerful
battery, the magnetic and mysterious current of love was passing.

"What do you see?" said David, at last.

"Shall I tell you?" she asked, lifting her eyes to his.

"If you please," he said.

"I will do so if you wish; but if the story of your life is really
written in the palm of your hands, it is sad indeed, and you would be
happier if you knew it not."

"But it is not written there. I do not believe it, nor do you."

"Let us hope that it is not," she answered, and began the following
monologue in a low musical monotone:

"Marked as it is with the signs of toil, this hand has still retained
all those characteristics that an artist would choose as a model. It is
perfect in its form. The palm is of medium size, the fingers without
knots, the third phalanges are all long and pointed, and the thumb is
beautifully shaped. Whoever possesses a hand like this must b