Meanwhile the innkeeper's wife, Crispina, had appeared, and had led Aglais and her daughter through the group in the porch into the house, and passing by a little _zothecula_,[31] behind the curtain of which they heard the sound of flutes,[32] as the carvers carved, and many voices, loud and low, denoting the apartment called _dieta_ or public room of the inn, they soon arrived at the _compluvium_, an open space or small court, in the middle of which was a cistern, and in the middle of the cistern a splashing fountain. The cistern was railed by a circular wooden balustrade, against which some creeping plants grew. This cistern was supplied from the sky; for the whole space or court in which it lay was open and unroofed. Between the circular wooden balustrade and the walls of the house was, on every side, a large quadrangular walk, lightly gravelled, and flashing back under the lantern which Crispina carried, an almost metallic glint and sparkle. Of course this walk presented its quadrangular form on the outer edge, next the house only; the inside, next the cistern, was rounded away. This quadrangular walk was at one spot diminished in width by a staircase in the open air, (but under an awning,) which led up to the second story of the large brick building. Around the whole _compluvium_, or court, the four inner faces of the inn, which had four covered lights in sconces against the walls, were marked at irregular intervals by windows, some of which were mere holes, with trap-doors (in every case open at present;) others, lattice-work, like what, many centuries later, obtained the name of arabesque-work, having a curtain inside that could be drawn or undrawn. Others again with perforated slides; others stretched with linen which oil had rendered diaphanous; others fitted with thin scraped horn; one only, a tolerably large window, with some kind of mineral panes more translucent than transparent--a _lapis laminata specularis_. At the back, or west of the inn, an irregular oblong wing extended, which of course could not open upon this court, but had its own means of light and ventilation north and south respectively. Crispus had followed the group of women, and our friend Paulus had followed Crispus. In the _compluvium_, the innkeeper took the lantern from his wife, and begged Aglais and Agatha to follow him up the awning-covered staircase. As he began to ascend, it happened that Crispina, looking around, noticed Paulus, who had taken off his broad-rimmed hat, under one of the sconces. No sooner had her eyes rested on him than she started violently, and grasped the balustrade as if she would have fallen but for that support. "Who are you?" said the woman. "The brother of that young lady who is ill, and the son of the other lady." "And you, too, must want lodgings?" "Certainly." The woman seized his arm with a vehement grip, and gazed at him.