hated it so when people stared at her as foreigners have a trick of
staring. It made Nancy happy to know that people thought her pretty, nay
beautiful, for it would have been dreadful for Jack, an artist, to marry an
ugly woman....

Locking her box she went out onto the shallow staircase, down the few steps
which led straight under the big arch of the porte cochere. It was thrown
hospitably open on to the narrow street now full of movement, colour, and
sound. But in vivid contrast to the moving panorama presented by the busy,
lane-like thoroughfare outside, was the spacious, stone-paved courtyard of
the hotel, made gay with orange trees in huge green tubs. Almost opposite
the porte cochere was another arch through which she could see a glimpse of
the cool, shady garden Jack remembered.

Yes, it was a strangely picturesque and charming old house, this Hotel
Saint Ange; but even so Nancy felt a little lost, a little strange,
standing there under the porte cochere. Then she saw that painted up on a
glass door just opposite the stairs leading to her room was the word
"Bureau": it was doubtless there that Jack had left word when he would
be back.

She went across and opened the door, but to her surprise there was no one
in the little office; she hadn't, however, long to wait, for Madame
Poulain's nephew suddenly appeared from the courtyard.

He had on an apron; there was a broom in his hand, and as he came towards
her, walking very, very slowly, there came over Nancy Dampier, she could
not have told you why, a touch of repulsion from the slovenly youth.

"I wish to know," she said, "whether my husband left any message for me?"