orously, but did not
interrupt her preparations for departure. "That she would say, since she
loves the Gorgio, and hates the rani. A rope round her neck to set the
rye free to make Chaldea--my curses on her--his true wife."

"She couldn't have fired the shot herself, you know," went on Miss
Greeby in a musing manner. "For then she would remove an obstacle to Mr.
Lambert marrying Lady Agnes."

"Blessings on her for a kind, Gentile lady," said Gentilla, piously,
and looking more respectable than ever, since the lurking devils had
disappeared. "But Chaldea is artful, and knows the rye."

"What do you mean?"

"This, my lady. Hearne, who was the Gorgio Pine, had the angel to wife,
but he did not hope to live long because of illness."

Miss Greeby nodded. "Consumption, Pine told me."

"If he had died natural," pursued Mother Cockleshell, pulling hard at a
strap, "maybe the Gentile lady would have married the golden rye, whom
she loves. But by the violent death, Chaldea has tangled up both in her
knots, and if they wed she will make trouble."

"So she says. But can she?"

"Hai! But she's a deep one, ma'am, believe me when I say so," Mother
Cockleshell nodded sapiently. "But foolish trouble has she given
herself, when the death of Hearne natural, or by the pistol-shot would
stop the marriage."

"What do you mean?" inquired Miss Greeby once more.

"You Gentiles are fools," said Gentilla, politely. "For you put other
things before true love. Hearne, as Pine, had much gold, and that he
left to his wife should she not marry the golden rye."

"How do you know that?"

"Chaldea was told so by the dead, and told me, my lady. Now the angel of
the big house would give up the gold to marry the rye, for her heart is
all for him. 'But,' says he, and tell me if I'm wrong. Says he, 'No. If
I make you my romi that would beggar you and fair it would not be, for a
Romany rye to do!' So, my lady, the red gold parts them, because it's
red money."

"Red money?"

"Blood money. The taint of blood is on the wealth of the dead one, and
so it divides by a curse the true hearts of the living. You see, my
lady?"

Miss Greeby did see, and the more readily, since she had heard Lambert
express exactly the sentiments with which the old gypsy credited him.
An overstrained feeling of honor prevented him in any case from making
Agnes his wife, whether the death had come by violence or by natural
causes. But it was amazing that Gentilla shoul