not interfere with her and there was nothing better to do.  She was twenty-eight, and confessed to twenty-four.  She danced as well as a professional, sang French songs in what she called a “twilight voice,” dressed better than most married women, did daring things, and had written two books which shocked Puritans.  Some of her own experiences had been worked into her novels, which made them read realistically; and clergymen in England and America had preached against them; so, of course, they were a great success and sold enormously.  Miss Dene herself was also a great success.  She went where she liked, alone if she liked, and during a visit to Rome she had lured desirable men from ladies who were engaged in flirting with them.  Angela, who was not flirting with any one, had been amused by the strange girl, but now she would have preferred a chance encounter with almost anybody else.

“Please call me Mrs. May,” she whispered, as they shook hands.  “I don’t want to be known by the other name.”

The tall young woman in white took in the situation, or a view of it, and the long green eyes (which she loved and copied for her heroines) smiled in a way that fascinated some people and displeased others.  Angela thought that, with the strong sunlight bringing out the value of red hair, black brows, white skin, and white frock, she was like a striking poster, sketched in a few daring lines, with splashes of unshaded colour dashed in between.

“How do you do, Mrs. May?” the girl amended her greeting.  “I thought I must be dreaming you.”

“I’m not sure that I’m not dreaming myself,” said Angela.

“I hope you haven’t come here for your health?”

“I wanted to see California.”

Miss Dene laughed.  “That doesn’t sound exciting.  But perhaps it is.”  She glanced again at Hilliard, to whom a porter had come for directions about luggage.  Nick was telling him that only Mrs. May’s and the maid’s luggage was to go in.  He intended to stop at another hotel.

“Oh, do ask That to lunch with you, and invite me and my friends to your table,” the girl suggested, in a stage whisper.  “I never saw anything so beautiful.  I must know him.  I’ve been seeking a hero for my new book which I’m going to write about California, and I feel he’s the one.  Pity the sorrows of the poor author!  If you don’t,” and she laughed to take away the sting, “I’ll tell every one who you are.  The reporters will get you—­as they have me.  But I liked it, and you wouldn’t.”

Angela wondered why she had ever admired red-haired women; and as for long, narrow green eyes, she now thought them hideous.  She was sure, in spite of the laugh, that Miss Dene was capable of keeping her word.

“I intended to ask him to lunch with me in any case,” she said calmly; and this was true.  But it was to have been a repetition of yesterday; quiet and peaceful, and idyllic.  “He is a Mr. Hilliard who has—­been detailed by a friend of my father’s to show me some places he knows.  That’s his car.  If you and your friends would care to join us, I should be delighted of course.”  Then she turned away, moving back a step or two nearer the edge of the veranda, and thus closer to Nick.