coming out. The
night will help us. I have marked every turn in the path. I pretended
to be moving the stones from the grass, and I was placing them where I
could feel them--in the dark."

"You are a wonderful girl, Cora, and your world must also be wonderful.
I have no fear of its strange ways--but my money? How shall I ever be
able to get that?"

"Never fear about the money," replied Cora cheerily. "What is
rightfully yours you will get. My friends are always the friends of
justice."

"And they will not fear the tribe?"

"The tribe will fear them. Wait and see. Now, what shall I sing--the
'Gypsy's Warning?'"

"Yes," and Helka lay back on her low divan.

Again Cora fingered the guitar. Daintily her fingers awoke the chords.
Then she sang, first low, then fuller and fuller until her voice rang
out in the night.

"Trust him not, oh, gentle lady,
Though his voice be low and sweet,
For he only seeks to win you,
Then to crush you at his feet!"

At each stanza Cora seemed to gain new power in her voice. Helka
raised herself on her arm. She was enchanted. The last line had not
died on Cora's lips when Helka repeated:

"Yes, I am the gypsy's only child!"

The remark was rather a plaint, and Cora came over very close to Helka.

"You must teach me a new song," she said. "I want one to surprise my
friends with."

"Then you are so sure of reaching them?"

"Positive. All America will seem small to me when I am free," and she
patted the hand of the queen.

"Free!" repeated the other. "I had never thought this captivity until
you came; then I felt the power of a civilized world, and I felt the
bondage of this."

The girls were speaking in subdued tones. A single word might betray
them if overheard. Yet they were too nervous to remain silent, and
Helka seemed so impressed, so agitated, at the thought of leaving,
forever, her strange life.

"Do you think it is safe about Lena?" she asked. "I would not like to
get that faithful child into trouble."

"It would be much safer to take her than to leave her here," Cora
reasoned, "for when they found us gone they would surely blame her."

"Yes, that is so. Well, I have never prayed, that has always seemed a
weak sort of way to struggle," said the queen, "but it seems to me now
that I must seek strength from some One more powerful than those of
earth. There _must_ be such a power."

"Indeed there is," replied Cora. "But now let us