The library looked tranquil enough as I entered it, and the Sibyl--
if Sibyl she were--was seated snugly enough in an easy-chair at the
chimney-corner. She had on a red cloak and a black bonnet: or
rather, a broad-brimmed gipsy hat, tied down with a striped
handkerchief under her chin. An extinguished candle stood on the
table; she was bending over the fire, and seemed reading in a little
black book, like a prayer-book, by the light of the blaze: she
muttered the words to herself, as most old women do, while she read;
she did not desist immediately on my entrance: it appeared she
wished to finish a paragraph.

I stood on the rug and warmed my hands, which were rather cold with
sitting at a distance from the drawing-room fire. I felt now as
composed as ever I did in my life: there was nothing indeed in the
gipsy's appearance to trouble one's calm. She shut her book and
slowly looked up; her hat-brim partially shaded her face, yet I
could see, as she raised it, that it was a strange one. It looked
all brown and black: elf-locks bristled out from beneath a white
band which passed under her chin, and came half over her cheeks, or
rather jaws: her eye confronted me at once, with a bold and direct
gaze.

"Well, and you want your fortune told?" she said, in a voice as
decided as her glance, as harsh as her features.