‘Go on looking,’ said the old woman, ’and tell me what you see.’  In a moment or two, I saw some one sitting on one of the stools, first dimly and then clearer and clearer.  ‘Why,’ I almost cried out, for I felt more and more frightened, ’I see a young man sitting at a desk, with a pen behind his ear.’  ’Can you see him clearly?’ ‘Yes,’ I said; ‘he’s got dark curly hair and blue eyes.’  ’You’re sure you won’t forget his face?  You’d know him if you saw him again?’ ‘Indeed, I would,’ I said.  ‘All right,’ said the old woman, ’you can give me back the crystal.  You keep a look out for that young man,—­you will see him some day, mark my words, and that young man will be your fate.’

“Now, surely, you won’t deny that was strange, will you?” asked Angel, in conclusion.  “And I shall never forget the start it gave me that day when I came in, quite unsuspecting, with your lunch-tray, and saw you talking to father, with your pen behind your ear, and your blue eyes and dark hair.  Now, isn’t it strange?  How can one help being superstitious after a thing like that?”

“Are you quite sure it was I?” Henry asked, quizzically.  “It appears to me that any presentable young man with a pen behind his ear would have answered nearly enough to the vision.  You would hardly have been quite sure of the colour of the eyes, would you, now, if the old woman hadn’t mentioned it first, as she looked at your hand?”

“You are horrid!” said Angel; “I wish I hadn’t told you now.  But it wasn’t merely the colour of the eyes.  It was the look in them.”

“Look again, and see if you haven’t made a mistake.  Look very carefully,” said Henry.

“I won’t,” said Angel; “I think you’re cruel.”

“Angel, if you’ll only look, and say you are quite sure, I’ll believe every word the old woman said.”

At last Angel was persuaded to look, and to look again, and the old woman’s credit rose at each look.

“Yes, Henry, whatever happens, I know it is true.  My life is in your hands.”

Those are solemn words for one human being to hear uttered by another; and a shiver of new responsibility involuntarily ran through Henry’s veins.

“May the hands be always strong and clean enough to hold so precious a gift,” he answered, gravely.

“Are you sad, dear?” asked Angel, presently, with a sort of divination.

“Not sad, dear, but serious,” he answered.

“Have I turned to a responsibility so soon?”

“You strange, wise child, I believe you are a witch.”

“Oh, I was right then.”

“Right in one way, but perhaps wrong in another.  Don’t you know that some responsibilities are the most dearly coveted of mortal honours?  But then we shouldn’t be worthy of them, if they didn’t make us feel a little serious.  Can’t you imagine that to hear another say that her life is in one’s hands makes one feel just a little solemn?”

“But isn’t your life in mine, Henry?” asked Angel, simply.