CHAPTER V WHEREIN CHARNOCK AND MIRANDA IMPROVE THEIR ACQUAINTANCESHIP IN A BALCONY Lady Donnisthorpe's house stood in Queen Anne's Gate, and the balcony overlooked St. James's Park. There Charnock found Miranda; he leaned his elbows upon the iron balustrade, and for a while neither of them spoke. It was a clear night of early June, odorous with messages of hedgerows along country lanes and uplands of young grass, and of bells ringing over meadows. In front of them the dark trees of the Park rippled and whispered to the stray breaths of wind; between the trees one line of colourless lamps marked the footpath across the bridge to the Mall; and the carriages on the outer roadway ringed that enclosure of thickets and lawns with flitting sparks of fire. Charnock was still holding the glove which he had picked up on the window-sill. "That's mine," said Miranda; "thank you," and she stretched out her hand for it. "Yes," said Charnock, absently, and he drew the glove through his fingers. It was a delicate trifle of white kid; he smoothed it, and his hand had the light touch of a caress. "Miranda," he said softly but distinctly, and lingered on the word as though the sound pleased him. Miranda started and then sank back again in her chair with a quiet smile. Very likely she blushed at this familiar utterance of her name, and at the caressing movement of his hand which accompanied and perhaps interpreted the utterance, or perhaps it was only at a certain throb of her own heart that she blushed. At all events, the darkness concealed the blush, and Charnock was not looking in her direction. The freshness of the night air had restored her, but she was very willing to sit there in silence so long as no questions were asked of her, and Charnock had rather the air of one who works out a private problem for himself than one who seeks the answer from another. The clock upon Westminster tower boomed the hour of twelve. Miranda noticed that Charnock raised his head and listened to the twelve heavy strokes with a smile. His manner was that of a man who comes unexpectedly upon some memento of an almost forgotten time. "That is a familiar sound to you," said Mrs. Warriner, and she was suddenly sensible of a great interest in all of the past life of this man who was standing beside her. "Yes," said Charnock, turning round to her. "You lived in Westminster, then? At one time I used to stay here a good deal. Where did you live?" Charnock laughed. "You would probably be no wiser if I named the street; it is not of those which you and your friends go up and down," he replied simply. "Yes, I lived in Westminster for three hard, curious years."