Hospitality, reflected Philip unquietly, was all
right in its place, but Diane was an extremist. After supper,
however--for Philip was inherently kind hearted and sympathetic--he
dispatched Ras to unhitch the minstrel's snorting steed and remove the
eccentric music machine from the highway. Johnny had already
accomplished both.
Smoking, Philip stared at the firelit hollow where his lady's
fire-tinted tents glimmered spectrally through the trees. He was
relieved to see that the camp's unbidden guest lay comfortably upon his
own blankets by the fire.
Somehow the minstrel's face, clean-shaven, strikingly brown of skin and
unmistakably foreign beneath the thatch of dark hair sparsely veined in
grey, lingered hauntingly in his memory.
"Where in thunder have I seen him before?" wondered Philip restlessly.
"There's something about his eyes and forehead--on the road probably,
for of course I've passed him a number of times. Still--Lord!" added
Philip with a burst of impatience, "what a salamander I am, to be sure!
Whittington, old top, ever since I've known our gypsy lady, I've done
nothing but fuss."
But, nevertheless, when Diane's camp finally settled into quiet for the
night, there was a watchful sentry in the forest who did not retire to
his bed of hay until Johnny was astir at daybreak.
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