The Return of the Gypsy Read Free Page B

felt warm and happy to be awarded the highest accolade which could be bestowed.
    “Now, Miss Amaryllis… she’s a little darling… so pretty and gentle like.”
    I was not in the least jealous. I would much rather be “A One” than pretty and gentle.
    The servants left me with no doubt in my mind that there was something special about Romany Jake. I could tell it by the manner in which they spoke of him and giggled when his name was mentioned. Although they were fairly frank with me, there were times when they remembered my youth, and although that did not prevent their talking, it curbed their spontaneity and they spoke in innuendoes which I sometimes found difficulty in deciphering.
    But I learned that the coming of Romany Jake was one of the most exciting things which had happened for a long time. He must have driven from their minds the thoughts of invasion for he was now the main topic of conversation in the servants’ hall.
    He was no ordinary gypsy. He was a Cornishman—half Spaniard, they reckoned, and I remembered that at the time of the defeat of the Spanish armada many of the Spanish galleons had been wrecked along the coast and Spanish sailors found their way ashore. So there was a sprinkling of Spanish blood in many a Cornish man or woman. It was evident in those dark eyes and curling hair and their passionate natures—all of which attributes were possessed, so I was told, by Romany Jake.
    “Romany Jake!” said Mabel. “What a name to go to bed with!”
    “I always think of him just as Jake,” said young Bessie, the tweeny. “I don’t think he’s a real gypsy. He’s come to it because he likes the wandering life.”
    “He looks like a gypsy,” I said.
    “Now what would you know about that, Miss Jessica?”
    “As much as you do, I suppose,” I retorted.
    “They’ve made quite a little home for themselves in that clearing. They’re shoeing their horses, setting up their baskets and doing a bit of tinkering. You can’t say they’re lazy, and Romany Jake, he plays to them and sings to them … and they all join in the singing. It’s like a play to see them.”
    “At least,” I said, “he has stopped you all talking about the invasion.”
    “I reckon Romany Jake would be a match for Boney himself,” said Mabel.
    And they all laughed and were very merry. That was what the coming of Romany Jake had done for them.
    I saw him once when I was alone. I had been down to the cottages to take a posset to Mrs. Green, wife of one of the stablemen who was suffering from a chill, and on my way back there he was. He had no right to be on our land, of course, and he was carrying something in his coat pocket. I believed he had been poaching.
    His eyes sparkled as he looked at me and I was aware of an acute pleasure because I fancied he was admiring me and as I was growing older I was becoming rather susceptible to admiration and experienced a kindly feeling towards those who expressed it. But it seemed particularly pleasant coming from him.
    So I had no desire to run away from him, nor to reprove him for poaching on our land.
    “Good day to you, little lady,” he said.
    “Good day,” I replied. “I know who you are. You’re Romany Jake. I met you in the woods the other day, I believe.”
    “I am certain of it, for having once made your acquaintance that would be something I should never forget. But that such a great lady as yourself should remember me … that is as gratifying as it is remarkable.”
    “You don’t speak like a gypsy,” I said.
    “I trust you will not hold that against me.”
    “Why should I?”
    “Because you might think that every man should keep his place … a gentleman a gentleman … a gypsy a gypsy.”
    I fancied he was laughing at me so I smiled.
    “I know you live in your caravan in the woods,” I said. “Are you staying long?”
    “The joy of the wandering life is that you go where you will when the spirit moves you. It is a great life lived under the sun,