Had he read my mind?
"Come along. " He headed up the hill. "You shouldn't be out alone at night. "
I fell into step beside him. "This is Lake Bluff. "
"You believe you're safe here?"
I did. Or at least I had. Safety had been one of the main attractions when I'd said yes to my father's job. That and not having another.
"Do you do double duty as an animal trainer and a fortune-teller?" I asked.
"Only our women possess the sight. Or so they'd like us to believe. "
We turned the corner, and my house rose up in front of us. Tall, stately, in the dark with the gibbous moon rising behind it, I could easily imagine it haunted. I shuddered.
"Cold?" Cartwright murmured.
I stared at his back. He hadn't even been looking at me when I'd shivered. I must have made a brrr sound and not been aware of it.
"I'm fine. "
He pushed the front gate open with a polite dip of his head. "I'll be sayin' good night then. "
"Since when are Gypsies Irish?" I blurted.
His teeth flashed. "Been waitin' all day to ask me that, have you?"
I shrugged.
"You're thinking I'm not a real Gypsy?"
"I wasn't thinking of you at all until you appeared out of nowhere. "
Liar. I'd thought of him on and off since I'd met him. How could I not?
The deepening of his smile said he knew I'd lied, and he liked it. I suppose lying was an admirable trait to a Gypsy.
I rubbed my forehead. I was as bad as Balthazar. I knew nothing about Gypsies beyond what I'd seen in the movies and on television.
"We are known as the Rom," Cartwright said. "The term 'Gypsy' came about because people believed we'd come from Egypt. "
"You didn't?"
"India, they say, though no one really knows for certain. "
"How did you end up in Ireland?"
"I lived in Ireland all my life until. . . recently. The Rom arrived long ago. When we left our homeland, we spread over the globe - Greece, Russia, Hungary, England, Scotland, and Ireland. "
"What about Romania?"
"That would be the Ludar. "
"Not Gypsies?"
"We prefer the name Rom. Those in Romania are known as the Ludar, just as the English are called Romnichels; the Serbs, Russians, and Hungarians, the Vlax. "
"Are those tribes?"