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“I see misfortune coming to you,” Samia replied.
“Indeed? And when is this dire thing to befall me?” Charlotte drawled.
“Soon, perhaps. I can’t say.”
“Of course you can’t. Because it does not exist. But if I tripped and fell, say, you could point and declare, there it is, the misfortune. Just as I predicted.”
“Charlotte,” said Harriet and Sarah at the same time.
Samia stood up. Harriet expected her to be hurt or offended, but she showed no signs of that. “I will say goodbye to you, Miss Finch. And your friends. We may be gone the next time you come here.”
“I’ll try to see you again,” replied Harriet.
“Thank you for the reading,” said Sarah.
“You are welcome.” With a regal bow of her head, Samia walked away.
Sarah turned on Charlotte. “How could you be so mean to a child?”
“I have no patience with that sort of gibberish.”
“She’s probably six years old!”
Charlotte looked guilty. “When she talked, she seemed older.”
Harriet started toward the path through the woods. The rest followed. As they passed under the first trees, Charlotte added, “She didn’t like me, so she gave me an ominous prediction.”
“Just be careful not to trip and fall,” replied Sarah caustically.
Charlotte sighed. “All right, I was too sharp with her. Shall I go back and apologize?”
“I don’t think Samia cared too much,” said Harriet.
“She is a very self-possessed child,” agreed her mother.
They took the shortest way back, there being no need to evade the watchers in this direction. The man on duty was startled to see them emerge from the woods and watched them pass by as if they might be apparitions.
“I suppose Papa has been looking for us to complain about the plants,” said her mother as they reached the Winstead Hall garden. “He put in the order himself.”
“And I’m sure he solved the problem on his own,” answered Harriet. “He always does. He never wishes to hear anyone else’s opinion.”
Her mother gave her a nervous glance and said her farewells. Harriet watched her slip off to look for a way to sneak into her supposed home.
She had passed out of sight when Cecelia, Duchess of Tereford, appeared from behind a bush that obscured a bend in the garden path. “There you are,” she said. “I called to see you, and you couldn’t be found. I was just heading back.”
She’d been lonely when they first came here, Harriet thought. Now Winstead Hall was as busy as an inn yard when the mail coach was due. She wished new arrivals would announce themselves with a blast from a yard of tin.
“We were visiting the Travelers’ camp,” replied Sarah. “So interesting. A little girl, Samia, read our palms.”
Cecelia looked amused. “I hope she saw good fortune.”
Charlotte snorted.
“Have you heard anything from Ferrington?” Harriet asked. Her attempt at disinterest fooled nobody, she noted.
“Not a word. I am a bit puzzled. James said he mentioned Tunbridge Wells…”
“What?” Harriet blinked. “We used to live in Tunbridge Wells. Mama and I.”
