"It may not be to you, but it is to me, if you don't mind," he persisted. "I—I made sure you'd know why I didn't—send you any word or—or anything. But if you didn't see it the right way, I've got to tell you now. It was because—of course, it was because—I just didn't dare butt in. I was afraid you'd feel, if I had the cheek to write a note, or follow up and speak to you in the hotel, that I was—kind of takin' advantage of what was an accident—my luck in gettin' a chance to do a little thing for you. A mighty small thing; 'twouldn't have been visible except in a high-powered microscope, and only then if you looked hard for it. So I said to myself, 'Twas enough luck to have had that chance.' I'd be a yellow dog to presume on it."
Instantly Angela realized that it was her vanity which had been hurt by his seeming negligence, and that it was stroked the right way by this embarrassed explanation. She was ashamed of herself for drawing it out, yet she was pleased; because she had been really hurt. Now that she need not puzzle over the man's motives, she would perhaps cease to think of him. But she must be kind, just for a minute or two—to make up for putting him in the confessional, and to prove the gratitude she wished to show.
"You must be a very modest person, if you didn't understand that I longed to hear—lots of things you wouldn't let the newspapers get hold of," she smiled. "Of course, it was interesting to read about that wretched man—Dutchy, or whatever they called him. And as he seems to have stolen from heaps of people, I suppose it's well for the world that he'll be shut up in prison—although I can't bear the thought of prison for any one. It stifles me. There ought to be some other kind of punishment. But I did want to know what happened in your room after——"
"Nothing much happened," said Nick. "The little beast was all in. I'd kind of got on his nerves, and he knew I'd dig a hole in the ground with him if he so much as peeped. I just rounded him up, and then the police came and played out the rest of the hand. As for you spoilin' my visit to New York, why ma'am, you made it. I had the time of my life."
Angela laughed, because he called her "ma'am" (which was even funnier than "lady," from the hero who had saved her life), and because all his expressions struck her as extremely "quaint."
"It was a very short time of your life then. I should have thought you'd want to stay weeks in New York, as you hadn't been there for so long—and you'd travelled so far. You see, I saw in the paper that you'd come from California. And that interested me, because my—because dear friends of mine have told me so much about California." She did not add that she was on her way there, but, of course, he might suspect, meeting her in New Orleans, if he were curious concerning her movements.
"I did mean to stay some time when I went East," he admitted, "but—well, perhaps I was homesick. Anyhow, I felt as if I'd got a hurry call to go home."
"What an odd coincidence, our meeting here!" Angela spoke out her thought.
"Ye-es," assented Nick. "I reckon it does seem that way." He was interested in the pattern of the carpet. "If you won't think it a liberty, now I am here," he began again, "I'll be mighty glad to try and find your bag. If you'll tell me just how and where you lost it——"
Angela shook her head. "You're not to spend your time fussing with the police, as you did in New York."