along
with Mrs. Badge.

II

"I've changed my mind about 'e, Mary," said the wise woman. "I'm terrible
unwilling to tell young people concerning the future as a rule--for why?
Because the future of most people be cruel miserable, and it knocks the
heart out of the young to hear of what's coming; but you'm a sensible
girl, and don't want to go through life blind. And another thing is this:
'tis half the battle to be fore-warned; and a brave man or woman can often
beat the cards themselves, and alter their own fate--if they only know it
in time."

After all this rigmarole Charity Badge bade Mary take a seat at the table.
Then she drawed the blind, and lighted a lamp; and then she fetched out a
pack of cards and her seeing-crystal. 'Twas all done awful solemn, and
Mary Tuckett without a doubt felt terrible skeered even afore t'other
began. Then Mrs. Badge poured a drop of ink into her crystal--some said
'twas only the broken bottom of an old drinking glass; but I don't know
nothing about that. Next she dealt out the cards, and fastened on the Jack
o' hearts and the Jack o' oaks,[1] and made great play with 'em. And,
after that, she sat and gazed upon the crystal with all her might, and
didn't take her eyes off of it for full five minutes.

[1] Oaks--Clubs.

"Now list to me, Mary Tuckett," she says, "and try to put a bold face on
what be coming, for there's trouble brewing for 'e--how much only you
yourself can tell."

With that she read out the fortune.

"There's a dark, rich man after you, Mary. He's fierce as a tiger, and the
folk don't like him, but he's good at bottom, and he'll make you a proper
husband. But there's another chap who have more right to you according to
the cards, and I see him in the crystal very plain. He's flaxen curled
with a straight back and a fighting nose, and blue eyes. Very great at
horsemanship seemingly, and he'll have you for a wife, so sure as death,
unless something happens to prevent it. He's on the way to you this
minute. He's the Jack o' hearts; and t'other man's Jack o' oaks. Now hold
your breath a bit while I look in the crystal and see what happens.

"Good powers!" cried the girl, creaming with terror down her spine. "'Tis
Nathan Coaker as you be seeing! I thought he'd forgot me a year agone!"

"Hush! Don't be talking. No, he ain't forgot you by the looks of it. Quite
the contrary."

Mary went white as curds, and sat with her hands forced over her heart to
hear wh