“Oh, do you think we could?” June’s tone was eager. “But how can I remember a thing I don’t recall?”
“There are people, great psychologists, who have ways of making people think back, back, back into the remotest corners of their past.”
“Do you know one of them?” June asked excitedly.
“Not at this moment, but I could find one, I think.”
“And now—” Florence’s tone changed. “I’ll have to leave you here. I—I have an appointment.”
Florence was, in the end, to find a psychologist, and that in the strangest possible manner. Meanwhile, her appointment was with Madame Zaran and her crystal ball. There was just time to make it.
She arrived, rather out of breath, to find the place much the same, yet somehow different. The crystal ball was in its place at the center of the room. The chair, the rug, the midnight blue draperies were the same. Madame Zaran came out with a smile to greet her. All was as before, and yet—the big girl shuddered—there seemed to be an air of hostility about the place.
“Yes, you may gaze into the crystal.” Madame’s claw-like hands folded and unfolded. “You may see much today. I have read it in a book, the book of the stars. You were born under a remarkable constellation. Yes, I do horoscopes as well. But now you shall gaze into the crystal ball.”
She withdrew. Florence was left alone with her thoughts and the crystal ball.
There followed a half hour’s battle between her thoughts and the magic ball. Her thoughts won. No beautiful island came to her in the ball, no stately trees, no still waters, nothing. Only the sordid little world which, it seemed, pressed in about her, stifling all beauty, all romance, filled her mind. With all her heart she wished that she was to fly away with Sandy and Jeanne to the magic of Isle Royale in winter.
“But I will not go.” She set her will hard. “I must not!”
And then there, standing before her, was Madame Zaran.
There was a strange light in the fortune teller’s eyes. She said but one word:
In that one word Florence seemed to feel a dark challenge.
“No!” Madame’s voice was harsh. “And there will be no visions for you. Never again. You have betrayed the sacred symbol!” Her voice rose shrill and high. Her short fingers formed themselves into claw-like curves. Her tiger-like hair appeared to stand on end.