"I am not at all afraid for myself," she answered a little pointedly, "but I am uneasy about Miss Ware. I do think, Ethel, you would do wisely to get a little further from that window."
"But I do assure you I am quite comfortable," I said, in perfect good faith.
I saw Mr. Marston glance for a moment with a malicious smile at Laura Grey. To me the significance of that smile was a little puzzling.
"I see you have got a piano there," he said to me, in his low tones, not meant for her ear. "Miss Grey plays, of course?"
"Yes; very well indeed."
"Well, then, would you mind asking her to play something?"
I had no idea at the time that he wanted simply to find occupation for her, and to fill her ears with her own music, while he talked on with me.
"Laura, will you play that pretty thing of Beethoven's that you tried last night?" I asked.
"Don't ask me, Ethel, dear, to-night; I don't think I could," she answered, I thought a little oddly.
"Perhaps, if Miss Grey knew," he said, smiling, "that she would oblige a shipwrecked stranger extremely, and bind him to do her any service she pleases to impose in return, she might be induced to comply."