The Gypsy's Daughter

Alexandra Herald and Central Otago Gazette, Issue 504, 17 January 1906, Page 8

The Gypsy's Daughter

1 By PHALIXY YALE CURTIS. I

(Oapyrlgbt, IKB, by tally Uoty Pab. On) ■• A GAIN, Leah! The gentlemea A. Tri* it" S&SB3 *But I am so tired, mamma.'* "Yes, yes! But see all the pennies. Once more and I will get thee a red scarf." And so, inspired by that promise, the little gypsy again broke into the strange fantastic dance, her tiny feet in perfect step, and time to the thrum, thrum of the mother's old guitar. Light as thistle down, she glided to and fro over the rough ground, the gypsies in their tagged, yet artistic, garb forming a picturesque background for the beautifully gowned women and their rich escorts, who crowded about the little dancer. To the casual observer the child was an enigma, seeming to possess two natures In one, while, to the keener mind, the solution was found .as one turned from the sweet, pure face of the mother to the father, handsome, yet crafty. The elfin child was in fact the' fitting Issue of so strange a union. As the visitors left the camp, the father, in reply to a sign from one of the gentlemen, followed to a turn of the road, where, the dingy tents, no longer visible, the gentleman, bidding the rest of the party drive on, called the man to him."

"The child 1b yooraf" ho inquired. "Mine/* "How old is ■her W^^ "Six years." "Who taught her to dance and sing?" "Like me she danc«, the Bong come from the mother." "Ah! So I thought And the resemble* you both?" "Why yon ask?" STFT^^ "Because I desire to know. Come, ' tell me all; you will not lose by it," commanded the gentleman, using, as he believed, the strongest persuasion. "Listen. Before Leah born the mother love me much. One day the queen tell her something I want her not to know. When I come home she turn from me. TJo not touch me, I hate you/ ■he said; the queen tell me all.'and I laugh and say. 'Ah, so the queen talk; some day she talk no more—but do not hate me or your child be like me.' And again I laugh, and that night the queen die and Leah born. "Half love, half hate is Leah; that way she be till I die. The stars have told it When I die she be like the mother always. Til! then she be as you see her now, part heaven, part hell." As the gypsy ceased speaking, the gentleman turned towards him with an expression of decision: "Would you like to sell your daughter?" "Sell her?" returned the man. ""* "Yes, sell her. You need money." "Yes, much. But the mother need Leah; It kiil her to lose her." "Well, don't tell her; steal her away. Shell get over It In time." "No, never, never," answered the gypsy, shaking his head. "Look here!" commanded the gentleman, "to-night after all are asleep bring to me; you know the place. I will have a for you to sign relinquishing all right to the child, and In return I give you %\.offl." "One thousand dollars?" echoed the man In a low. half-doubting tone. "Yes, sl/MO; It's a lot of money." "Yes, a lot," the man hesitated. With It he knew he could be chief of the tribe, a position he'had long coveted. And yet he felt It would kill the mother. "Well?" Interrogatively. "Yes, I bring her to-night It be as you say. I promise." And the gypsy tumed back to the little camp. Shortly after midnight a man with a child closely clasped In his arms walked hurrjedly along one of the great boulevards of the city As he neared a handsome residence, in the window of which a soft Hght burned, he paused, then creeping softly to a side donr, he gave a low knock; the door opened and the ■an with the child entered. "Lay her there," was the command tt the gentleman, pointing to a low eouch. The man complied. The door opened and the man was gone, leaving his little one asleep { n the rich room; while ou a bleak hillside a mother slept, her arm thrown over th« cover!»t, seeming to hold within Its clasp a lUUe child.

-Ton laid, monsieur, the child could •fng?"

"Like an angeL Come, L ;ah. the professor wishes to try your voice."

Tnt I ;':.r.'i wan! to sing." and. unheeding a!i':e rrtrrnty and command, ■the child, a c;r« <: about 12 years, with a willful, yet !><r?' iful cypsy face, whirled; v.- y into ;.:;utherdanee. As o - wi'.tch"! h~r he r.oted the grace ami fir oi every motion. She seemed a creatine of air. so light was she. With pence* *:un and abandon, she fo'fo*.v«d every change of the music, seen Iris nf "T to tire. As *!u player's lingers wandered off Into some sweet minor chords there came a startled look into her face. Then. as the music continued in the plaintive strain, she yielded to the spell. Once ninrf her body swayed to that fantastic dance of her childhood, once more her rose and fell to that weird sweet song. And, as he listened, over the face of the master there camp a look of rapture, while with the instinct, of the true musician, he accompanied the strange air with all its subtle changes. Then, as the song ended in a breathing of heartbreak and despair, he turned to the child, the tears streaming down his pintle old fa^e. "Ah. monsieur, monsieur!" he cried, , "it Is the voice of an angel!"

While her child was singing far away across the sea, the mother was dying. On a poor bed with scarcely covering for her wasted body, she lay, clasping to her breast a little dress, old and worn.

As her husband bent over her, trying in his rude fashion to adjust the ragged pillow—"Hark!" she whispered. "Listen! I hear my Leah Binging."

The great auditorium was filled to overflowing. Every seat, in the vast room was taken rr.d the boxes were taxed to their utmost capacity. Never had a prima donna sung to a more cui'tired and enthusiastic audience.

Time after time, the great house had broken out into uncontrollable applause, and now. as the performance neared its < lose, "Leah, the gypsy." again appeared, and the people once niore st tiled into the expectant quiet that always accompanies the presence of a star.

!A perfect type of gypsy brauty was she; hair the blackness of night, eyes where hid that dangerous blending of . love and fire. cheeks through whose J olive the tint of <•;-.rim"n« gleamed, lips } of ihf rich red that belongs to all tropil cal nar tin s.

A moment she stood gazing out over that vast sea of faces. One arn«i~g them she knew was there watchiii-; lit»r with eyes full of question and longing. So she had met his Raze for years, almost since the morning he first saw her a little child asleep in his father's libr? ry.

That she was a gypsy he knew, but where she came from or why to 1»1 ifather'? house he had never learned. That father, a stern, silent man, had never courted inquiry. About a .year before Leah's ccr.i'.-t to their home tht light of the place had cone out with the death of an only daughter, the idol of the widowed fat iter. To that lost darliiif: Leah bore more than a passing resemblance and because of this likeness, the boy shrewdly guessed that the little n'rl had come to take the dead child's place., Though he loved Leah, to him she had always been an eni?rma. Together (liey had grown to manhood ard woman hood, and as yet he could not fathom her dual ;.:r.ure.

Nor him. To his question and pleading she could only say: "Some day, when the evil power Laves me, you shall claim me; till then hi content. Some day I shall be free; the stars have told it. And with freedom will come the memory of that gypsy sor : g my mother taught me. Once it returned and I thought I heard her calling me —but it was only fancy—and the song is forgotten."

And now, as he gazed longingly at this woman, so strange, yet so beautiful, a woman in whose soul two spirits seemed striving for the mastery, one good, the other evil, he noted a startled listening expression flit across her face. Tjrr eyes looked far beyond. She saw not the jrreat audipnee; unheeded was the orchestral prelude. Iter soul was far away; she saw a eynsy camp, a circle of admiring faces clustered round a little child; she heard the thrum, thrum of an old guitar and a mother's voice pleading: "Again, L»ah." Once nrore. as if led by a power ot T ier than her will, the lithe form swayed to that dance of long ago; once more was heard the song so sad and weet. Again she felt the tender, lovine; presence of her mother; a gentle peace stole into her heart, her sou! seemed filled with rapture; and, as her song died away in the last weird notes. she turned to her lover, her eyes wet with the sweet due of love, her voice full of the tender notes of surrender, and as he listened he knew that the evil power had left her, that the beautiful gypsy was his forever.

In the rear neat long after the andi**n<''> had dispersed ?a» a dark-faced mnn. hi= handsome, yet wicked, gypsy fp.ro still turned towards the empty stage. Quite still he sat and nMther moTed nor spoke. The man was dead. Ornnm«*nfal Scars. In New Holland the women rut themselves with shells, and. keeping the wounds open for a lone lime, form sears in t'v- flesh,which they rt<em highly ornamental. Another mark nf beauty consists of having linger nails so long that ea&ings of bamboo are necessary to protect them from injury. Cheap Hnr»e-P«»Tror. The melting snows and glaciers of tho Rockies ar.d petroleum now furnish such abvr.dant pow?r for San Francisco that the cuet ui cv..--horse power one hour is just two cents. A man is not a farmer just because he has hay fever.