''The Queen of Diamonds,'' I said at last. ''Great wealth, I think.''
''Great wealth?'' She leaned away from me and looked about her, at the faded carpet and the black oak walls. I took the cards and shuffled them. She brushed at her skirt and rose. ''I don''t believe,'' she said, ''that your grandmother really was a gipsy. You are too fair in the face. I don''t believe it. And I don''t like your fortune-telling. It''s a game for servants.''
She stepped away from me, and stood again before the glass; and though I thought she would turn and say something kinder, she didn''t. But as she went, she moved a chair: and then I saw the Two of Hearts. It had fallen on the floor—she had had her slipper on it, and her heel had creased the pips.
The crease was a deep one. I always knew that card, after that, in the games we played, in the weeks that followed.
That afternoon, however, she made me put the cards away, saying the sight of them made her giddy; and that night she was fretful. She got into bed, but had me pour her out a little cup of water; and as I stood undressing I saw her take up a bottle and slip three drops from it into the cup. It was sleeping-draught. That was the first time I saw her take it. It made her yawn. When I woke next day, though, she was already awake, lying with a strand of her hair pulled to her m