All this, that takes so long to describe, Blake saw with the first and second glance.  The man at once began to speak in a quiet and respectful voice.

“Are you Mr. Blake?” he asked.

“I am.”

“Mr. Arthur Blake?”

“Yes.”

“Mr. Arthur Herbert Blake?” persisted the other, with emphasis on the middle name.

“That is my full name,” Blake answered simply, adding, as he remembered his manners; “but won’t you sit down, first, please?”

The man advanced with a curious sideways motion like a crab and took a seat on the edge of the sofa.  He put his hat on the floor at his feet, but still kept the bag in his hand.

“I come to you from a well-wisher,” he went on in oily tones, without lifting his eyes.  Blake, in his mind, ran quickly over all the people he knew in New York who might possibly have sent such a man, while waiting for him to supply the name.  But the man had come to a full stop and was waiting too.

“A well-wisher of mine?” repeated Blake, not knowing quite what else to say.

“Just so,” replied the other, still with his eyes on the floor.  “A well-wisher of yours.”

“A man or—­” he felt himself blushing, “or a woman?”

“That,” said the man shortly, “I cannot tell you.”

“You can’t tell me!” exclaimed the other, wondering what was coming next, and who in the world this mysterious well-wisher could be who sent so discreet and mysterious a messenger.

“I cannot tell you the name,” replied the man firmly.  “Those are my instructions.  But I bring you something from this person, and I am to give it to you, to take a receipt for it, and then to go away without answering any questions.”

Blake stared very hard.  The man, however, never raised his eyes above the level of the second china knob on the chest of drawers opposite.  The giving of a receipt sounded like money.  Could it be that some of his influential friends had heard of his plight?  There were possibilities that made his heart beat.  At length, however, he found his tongue, for this strange creature was determined apparently to say nothing more until he had heard from him.

“Then, what have you got for me, please?” he asked bluntly.

By way of answer the man proceeded to open the bag.  He took out a parcel wrapped loosely in brown paper, and about the size of a large book.  It was tied with string, and the man seemed unnecessarily long untying the knot.  When at last the string was off and the paper unfolded, there appeared a series of smaller packages inside.  The man took them out very carefully, almost as if they had been alive, Blake thought, and set them in a row upon his knees.  They were dollar bills.  Blake, all in a flutter, craned his neck forward a little to try and make out their denomination.  He read plainly the figures 100.

“There are ten thousand dollars here,” said the man quietly.