When he reached the hotel it was dinner-time, and hoping that Mrs. May might invite him to her table, as she had before, he dressed carefully, despite his inconvenient quarters.  When he was ready, however, his heart failed him.  It seemed too good to be true that his luck should hold.  She would probably be dining in her own sitting-room, or else she would have had enough of his company earlier in the day.  But no, there she was in the restaurant, at the same table where they had lunched together; and after all everything arranged itself very simply.  He had to tell her the news of the gold bag—­his version of it; and hearing that it might be restored, she exclaimed, “You’re wonderful!  I’m sure it’s all through you.  It will be nice to have my dear bag again, when I go aboard the train.”

It was a pleasant dinner for both, and each seemed to find out a good deal about the other’s likings and dislikings, though—­perhaps purposely, perhaps by accident—­they said singularly little about their own affairs, their past lives, or future intentions.  Afterward, in her own room, Angela laughed as she thought over the day and the queer things she had somehow been led into doing.

“It’s too quaint that I should have borrowed money of him!” she said to herself, giggling under her breath like a schoolgirl.  “Of course, on top of that, it’s nothing at all that I should invite him to lunch and dine.  And the funniest part is, it never once seemed queer at the time, or as if I could do anything else.”

At all events she had no regrets.  The coincidence of Mr. Nickson Hilliard’s appearance in New Orleans, just as her hour of need was striking, had given a bright side to what would otherwise have been a disagreeable and sordid adventure.  Certainly there was something about him that inspired confidence.  She felt that through him she might retrieve her bag; and, if, by chance, the money were intact she could pay him what she owed.  He would then return the miniature frame, and it would not be necessary to give her address or say where she was going!  Not that he would misuse such information.  She was sure of this now, and she could not help being pleased that he had come back into her life just for one day—­long enough to explain himself.

Next morning, at a quarter-past ten precisely, a note was brought to her room.  It began: 

“Dear Madam” (Nick had not dared venture upon “Dear Mrs. May”; it had not even occurred to him that he might), and informed her primly that the bag had arrived.  Also it inquired in stiff language whether the writer might be permitted to place it in her hands.

Angela laughed as she read, partly with pleasure because her bag was found, partly because the poor young man’s stiffness amused her.  She knew enough about him now to understand that it was shyness and ignorance of social customs; but earlier she might have thought she had offended him.  “Anyway, he writes a good hand,” she thought.  “Full of character and strength and not a bit uneducated.”