id, upon his
bed of sickness, of our host's daughter, I determined within myself not
only to stand aside, and let him win if he could, but to help him by all
the means within my power. And so it came about that later I told Lucy
that his recovery depended upon her kindness, and won her to look upon
him with compassion and with tenderness.

Mr. Clint, the lawyer, came from London, and arrangements were made for
Marmaduke to continue in Harvey Gerard's care, and when Marmaduke was
convalescent the Gerards removed him to their residence in Harley
street. After I had bidden them farewell, I rode slowly towards
Fairburn, but was stopped at some distance by a young gypsy boy, who
summoned me to the encampment to converse with the aged woman whom I had
seen on the occasion of the accident. She bade me sit down beside her,
and after a time produced the silver-mounted flask, concerning whose
history I felt great curiosity. I asked her how it came into her
possession, and she herself asked a question in turn.

"Has it never struck you why Sir Massingberd has not long ago taken to
himself a young wife, and begotten an heir for the lands of Fairburn, in
despite of his nephew?"

"If that be so," said I, "why does not Sir Massingberd marry?"

Thereupon she told me that many years ago he had joined their company,
and shared their wandering fortune. Her sister Sinnamenta, a beautiful
girl beloved by the handsome Stanley Carew, had fascinated him, and he
would have married her according to gypsy rites; but since her father
did not believe that he meant to stay with the tribe longer than it
suited him, he peremptorily refused his request. Sir Massingberd left
them; they struck tent at once, and travelled to Kirk Yetholm, in
Roxburghshire, a mile from the frontier of Northumberland. There the
wretch followed her, and again proposed to go through the Cingari
ceremony, and this time the father consented. It was on the wedding-day
that he gave my informant the shooting-flask as a remembrance, just
before he and his wife went away southward. Long months afterwards
Sinnamenta returned heart-stricken, woebegone, about to become a mother,
with nothing but wretchedness in the future, and even her happy past a
dream dispelled.

The gypsies were at Fairburn again, and Sinnamenta's father sent for Sir
Massingberd, and he was told that the marriage was legal, Kirk Yetholm
being over the border. An awful silence succeeded this disclosure. Sir
Ma