"You don't know anybody at Pirate Beach?" she suggested.
"Not a living soul but you, my friend—no, not even the name of the place until now. Pirate Beach! Jove, an unpleasantly suggestive name."
"There's nothing in the name, though there might have been many years ago. There's no danger now, young sir"—wheedingly.
"Glad to hear it, I'm sure. Well, is there any hotel hereabout?"
"A matter of five miles or so on a lonely road."
"Too long a tramp for a lazy man. Maybe they will give me a bed up yonder."
A hoarse cry issued from the woman's lips, and, recoiling from him, she suddenly lifted her skinny right arm on high, and almost shrieked, so loud and uneven was her voice:
"Young man, venture not now or ever beneath the roof of Gray Gables. It is written in the stars that Fate threatens thee there!"
Dorian Mountcastle stared, then laughed at her tragic turn.