“How smooth the fingers are!  And how they taper to the cone,” continued Pepeeta.  “Here is this one of Jupiter, for example.  How plainly it tells of religiousness and perhaps of fanaticism!  The Sun finger is not long.  Nay, it is not long enough.  There is too little love of glory here.  And the Saturnian finger is too long.  The life is too much under the dominion of Fate or Destiny.  The Mercurial finger is short.  He will be firm in his friendships.  The moons all correspond.  They, also, are too large.  The Mount of Venus, here at the base of the thumb, is excessively developed, and indicates capacity for gentleness, for chivalry, for tenderness and love.  The Mount of the Moon is small.  That is good.  There will be no disturbance of the brain, no propensity towards lunacy.  Mars is not excessive, but it is strong, and he will be bold and courageous, but not quarrelsome.”

The pleasant murmur of the voice, the gentle pressure of her hand, her nearness and her beauty, had rendered the Quaker absolutely oblivious to her words.

“Let me now examine the lines,” she continued.  “Here is the line of the heart.  It passes clear across the palm.  It is well marked at every point and is most pronounced upon the upper side.  The love will not be a sensual passion, but look! it is joined to the head below the finger of Saturn.  It is the sign of a violent death!  Heavens!”

As she uttered this exclamation, she pressed the hand convulsively between her own, and looked up into his face.

The involuntary and sudden action recalled him to his consciousness.  “What did you say?” he asked.

“Have you not been listening?” she replied, repressing both her anxiety and her annoyance.

“No; was it a good story or a bad one which you were reading?”

“It was both.”

“Well—­it is no matter, those accidental marks can have no significance.”

“Do you think so?”

“I am sure.”

“You do not believe in any signs?”

“None.”

“You know that the traveler on the desert told the Bedouin that he did not, and yet from the foot prints of the camels the Bedouin deciphered the whole history of a caravan.”

Astonished at her reply, David did not answer.

“And then, you know,” she continued, “there are the weather signs.”

“Yes—­that is so.”

“And what are the letters of a book but signs?”

“You are right again.”

“And is not hardness a sign of something in a stone, and heat of something in fire?  And are not deeds the sign of some quality in a man’s soul, and the expressions of his face signs of emotions of his heart?”

“They are.”

“So that by his gait and gestures each man says:  ’I am a farmer—­a quack—­a Quaker—­a soldier—­a priest’?”

“This, too, is true.”

“Why, then, should not the character and destiny of the man disclose itself in signs and marks upon his hands?”