My "genius" comment above was a bit salty and over the top. But, I had so many bad experiences with recruiters (of a company, independent) that is quite difficult at this point for me to take them seriously or offer any (professional, I am not talking about human of course) respect beyond what I grant to anyone, from poor to rich companies, from guilty to innocent managers, from stripes to stars. I understand it is the nature of the job, but also that the nature of jobs tends to attract certain people.
For example, the most common behavior with these recruiting companies (and I am fully employed and paid very well) is that they take 30 minutes of my time with the usual general questions, then they make me chat with some sort of hiring manager of the target company, then they send an email "I will let you know in a few days", and they never write back. I send an email saying "so?" and I never get an answer. Then, I find out they moved into real estate.
Ten, 15 times over a few years (why I continued answering? The hiring companies were quite interesting, one in Vegas, some in the East Coast where I don't have much of a network, they could, with emphasis on the conditional tense, be useful).
We can say that they are just a little piece of a bad process, or that it is the hiring manager/company fault, or "yes, but you did not have to deal with certain rude candidates" (and I have seen plenty of those rude candidates, there I certainly offer my solidarity). And if we go on with the circumnavigation of people, we find a justification for any sort of less-than-good behavior. If telling lies is part and parcel of one's job, they (recruiters/hiring managers/C-level) are still liars, they don't get a pass in my book.
It sounds like you found a decent recruiter and it is quite telling that a recruiter re-initiating a conversation and apologizing, things I happen to do also in my job, is now an "off-the-charts" EQ genius. That's the 101 for anyone with a modicum of professionalism. I am sure there are great recruiters around like there are plenty of needles in haystacks.