Grace North - Nan of the Gypsies

One glorious autumn day, when the pale mellow gold of the sunshine softened the ruggedness of the encircling mountains and lay caressingly on the gnarled live oaks, on the sky-reaching eucalyptus, and on the red-berried pepper trees, a tinkling of bells was heard on the long highway that led into the little garden village of San Seritos, half asleep by the gleaming blue Pacific. A gypsy caravan, consisting of three covered wagons drawn by teams of six mules, and followed by a string of horses, drew to one side of the road and stopped. A band of nut-brown, fox-like children scrambled down and began to race about, the older ones gathering sticks for the camp fire which they knew would soon be needed.

Four men, aquiline nosed, and with black hair hanging in ringlets to their shoulders, and as many women, gaudily dressed, with red and yellow silk handkerchiefs wound about their heads, prepared to make camp for the night.

It was a fittingly picturesque spot for a clump of gnarled live oaks grew about a spring of clear, cold water, which, fed from some hidden source, was never dry.

A quarter of a mile away lay the first of the beautiful estates and homes of Spanish architecture, for which San Seritos was far famed.

One of the gypsy women paused at her task to shade her eyes and gaze back over the highway as though expecting someone.

A mis-shapen goblin-like boy tugged on her sleeve, and with a wistful expression in his dark eyes, he whispered, “Manna Lou, Nan hasn’t run away again, has she?”

“I don’ no,” the gypsy answered, drearily. “Maybe yes and maybe not.”

A moment later, when the woman had returned to her task, there was a screaming of delight among the fox-like children, and Tirol, the mis-shapen boy, cried in a thrill glad voice, “Here she comes, Manna Lou! Here comes Gypsy Nan.”

Toward them down the mountain drive, galloping on a spirited mottled pony, rode a beautiful young girl of thirteen, her long black hair, straight to her shoulders, suddenly broke into a riot of ringlets and hung to her waist. Her gown and headdress were as bright as maple leaves in Autumn, and her dark brown eyes were laughing with merriment and mischief.

As she sprang from her pony, the gypsy children leaped upon her, uttering animal-like cries of joy, but Tirol, hobbling to her side, caught her warm brown hand in his thin claw-like one and looked up at her with adoration in his hungering black eyes as he said: “I was ’fraid, Sister Nan, ’fraid you had gone again, and maybe this time for good.”

The gypsy girl knelt impulsively and caught the mis-shapen boy in her arms, and her eyes flashed as she said passionately: “Little Tirol, Nan will never, never go for good as long as you need her to protect you from that wicked Anselo Spico. I hate him, hate him, because he abuses a poor boy who can’t grow strong and defend himself, but he won’t strike you again, little Tirol, unless he strikes me first.”

“Hush!” warningly whispered Cyra, a small gypsy girl. “Here comes Spico. He’s been ahead to look over the village.”

It was evident by the suspending work in the camp that the approaching horseman was someone of importance in their midst. A Romany rye was he, dressed in blue corduroy with a scarlet sash at his waist and a soft scarlet ribbon knotted about his broad brimmed felt hat.

His dark, handsome face, which, when in repose had an expression of either vanity or cruelty, was smiling as he dismounted from his spirited black horse.

Gypsy Nan, who had been standing in the shadow of a live oak with protecting arms about the goblin-like Tirol breathed a sigh of relief, for the hated Spico was evidently in the best of spirits. He called gayly after the tall gypsy lad who was leading his horse away: “Soobli, where is Mizella, your queen? Call her forth, I have good news to tell.”

While he was talking the curtains of the largest van were pushed apart, an old hag-like gypsy appeared, and, with much groaning, made her way down the wooden steps to the ground. There she leaned heavily on a cane, and hobbling toward her son, asked eagerly: “What’s the pickings like to be, Spico? Is it a rich gorigo town?”

“Rich, Mother Mizella?” the handsome young rye repeated. “The gorigo around here has his pockets lined with gold and will spend it freely if he is amused. You women dress in your gayest and start out tomorrow with your tambourines. You will gather in much money with your fortune telling and we men in the village will not be idle.”

Then, going to the camp fire, over which a small pig was being roasted, he asked, looking around sharply. “Where is leicheen Nan? If she has run away again, I’ll – ”

“No, no, Nan hasn’t run away,” the gypsy woman, Manna Lou, hastened to say. “She’s here, Spico. Come Nan, dearie,” she called pleadingly. “Come and speak pleasant.”

The girl, with a defiant flashing of her dark eyes, stepped out of the shadow of a low-branching live oak and stood in the full light of the camp fire.

“Leicheen Nan,” the Romany rye said, and his words were a command, “tomorrow you will go to the village and dance at the gorigo inn. You have idled long enough.”

It was the gypsy woman, Manna Lou, who replied. “Not yet, Spico,” she implored in a wheedling tone – “Nan is only a little gothlin. Wait until she is grown.”

Before the angered young rye could answer, Mizella hobbled to the camp fire and snarled angrily: “I am queen. My word is law. That good-for-nothing leicheen Nan shall do as my son says.”

The girl stepped back into the shadow, her heart rebellious. She said nothing, but she was determined that she would not obey.

The men then sat about the fire and were served by the women, who, with the children afterwards ate what was left.

The moon came up, and Nan, nymph-like, danced up a grassy hill back of the camp. A throng of wild, fox-like little children scrambled up after her. “A story. Tell us a story, Nanny,” they called. The girl paused, turned and seeing the crippled Tirol struggling to climb the hill, she ran back, lifted him to her strong young shoulder and carried him to the top of the knoll. There they all sat together, many bright black eyes watching while Nan told them a story. A fanciful tale it was of how a gypsy princess had been cruelly treated by a wicked man like Anselo Spico. How he had shut the princess and six other gypsy girls, who had defied him, in a van without horses and had let it roll down a cliff road into the sea. “But they were not drowned, for the spirits of the sea-spray carried them up to the sky, and any clear night you can see that gypsy princess and the six gypsy girls dancing in their bright crimson and gold shawls and you call it the sun-set.”

Tirol, always the most intense of Nan’s listeners leaned forward and asked in a low whisper: “What did the sea-spray spirits do to – to that wicked Romany rye?”

“That night,” the gypsy girl said in a low voice of mystery, “he went to the top of a cliff to make sure the van had gone into the sea, and it had, for it lay broken in the surf. Then the sea-spray spirits lifted a wave as high as a hill and it swept over the cliff and that wicked Romany rye was seen no more.”

Tirol’s black eyes glowed in the moonlight and his frail hand was trembling as Nan took it to lift him again to her shoulder.

“Steal back soft-like, so he won’t know we left camp,” she warned. Crouching low, the file of little fox-like children crept back of trees and brush until the vans were reached, then darted between the flaps and crawled, without undressing, into their bunk-like beds, all but Nan and Tirol. The gypsy girl felt smothered if she slept in the van.