paradise in which I have dwelt for the past eight years, a nameless
woman, a waif of the coal pits, of the streets of New York. But I will
not submit to have Margaret Hill engraved on my tombstone, for, however
alloyed, in my veins there is a drop of golden blood. ‘Countess Tann,’
would make the gods on their thrones rock with mirth, and in time the
world would hear and laugh too, and this beloved Bavaria, which has
shown me surpassing kindness, would be put to shame. Therefore have I
ordered my body purified by fire and the ashes cast on the Isar. Then
will it dwell with music forever.
“I bequeath you my Will.
“I dare not see you again.
“_Siegfried! Siegfried! Selig grüsst dich dein Weib!_”
LXII
THE IVORY TOWER OF ORDHAM
Bridgminster’s manners are almost as famous as his diplomatic gifts and
achievements. They are, indeed, so perfect, that many—notably the women
that have tried to marry him—aver that he is composed wholly of charm
and brain; that his heart, if ever he had one, is buried in the American
grave of his young wife, whom he had the terrible misfortune to lose so
soon after his romantic marriage. That dramatic finale of his youthful
happiness occurred not so long since but that people still gossip about
it, recall his desperate flight to the Continent immediately after the
funeral of the divine Mabel, where he affected the company to tears by
his manifest woe. No one was surprised to hear of his illness—brain
fever?—in one of the British Legations—Munich? Rome? Constantinople?
He has such a vast connection, and details will slip from the best of
memories.
When quite well again, however, he threw himself into work with an
ardour! In the course of three or four years, between those gifts the
good Lord had showered upon him, an industry at which his family has not
ceased to marvel, and the influence he was able to command, his
advancement in the diplomatic service was uncommonly rapid. He has gone
on rising ever since, not alone in the service, but in the estimation of
Europe, whose attention he has challenged more than once, and in a
manner which assures him a place in history.
Princess Nachmeister died quite satisfied with him.
No man in Europe is more gay, more brilliant, more constantly in
society. He looks, say those so fond of discussing him, like a man whose
heart is just twenty-five, and theorize that its normal action was
arrested at that age by the loss of his sweet young wife—a marvel of
beauty, and elegance, and cleverness, and grace!—and when the heart
never grows old—well, we all know what happens.
So is Mabel avenged.
But the room in The Temple is Ordham’s still.
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TRANSCRIBER NOTES
Mis-spelled words and printer errors have been fixed.
[The end of _The Tower of Ivory_ by Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton]