For the first time he began to ponder what was the nature of the peril in which Miranda stood. His speculations were of no particular value, but the fact that he speculated at this spot, opposite the house, opposite the door, was. For, quite unconsciously, his eyes took an impression of the geometrical arrangement of the copper nails with which it was encrusted, or rather sought to take such an impression. For the geometrical figures were so intricate in their involutions that the eyes were continually baffled and continually provoked. Charnock was thus absently searching for the key to their inter-twistings when he walked across the road and knocked. He was conducted through the patio. He was shown into the small dark-panelled parlour which overlooked the valley. The door was closed upon him; the room was empty. A book lay open upon the table before the window. Charnock stood in front of this table looking out of the window across to the sierras; so that the book was just beneath his nose. He had but to drop his eyes and he would have read the title, and known the subject-matter, of the book, and perhaps taken note or some pencil lines scored in the margin against a passage here and there, for the book had been much in Miranda's hands these last few days. But he did not, for he heard a light step cross the patio outside and pause on the threshold of the door. Charnock turned expectantly away from the table. The door, however, did not open, nor on the other hand were the footsteps heard to retreat. A woman then was standing, quite silent and quite motionless, on the other side of that shut door; and that woman, no doubt, was Miranda. Charnock was puzzled; he, too, stood silent and motionless, looking towards the door and wondering why she paused there and in what attitude she stood. For the seconds passed, and there must have been a lapse of quite two minutes between the moment when the footsteps ceased and the moment when the door was flung open. For the door was flung open, noisily, violently, and with a great bustle of petticoats an unknown woman danced into the room humming a tune. She stopped with all the signs of amazement when she saw Charnock. "Oh!" she exclaimed, "why didn't they tell me?" She cast backwards over her shoulder that glance of the startled fawn which befits a solitary maid in the presence of a devouring man. Then she advanced timidly, lowered her eyes, and said: "So you have come to Ronda, then?"