Mexico Missouri message. (Mexico, Audrain County, Mo.) 1899-1918, 1910-01-20
CHAPTER u.

There was good copy for the news
papers on both sides of the Atlantic
in the news that the famous lyric So
prano, MaTgarita da Cordova, whose
real name was Miss Margaret Dome,
was engaged to Mons. Konstantin
Logotheti, a Greek financier of large
fortune established in Paris, and al
most as well known to art collectors
as to needy governments, would-be
promoters, and mothers of marriage
able daughters.
The engagement was made known
during the height of the London sea-
son, not long after they had both been
at a weekend party at Craythew,
Lord Creedmore's place in Derbyshire
where they had apparently come to a
final understanding after knowing
each other more than two years. Mar
garet was engaged to sing at Covent
Garden that summer, and the first
mention of the match was coupled
with the information that she intended
to cancel all her engagements and
never appear in public again. The re-
suit was that the next time she came
down the stage to sing the Waltz
Song in Romeo and Juliet" she re-
ceived a tremendous ovation before
she opened her handsome lips, and
another when she had finished the
air; and she spent one of the happiest
evenings she remembered.
Though she was at heart a nice
English girl, not much over "a years
of age, the orphan daughter of an Ok
ford don who had married an Ameri-
, can, she had developed, or fallen, to
the poin. at which very popular and
| successful artists cannot live at all
without applause, and are not happy
unless they receive a certain amount
Of adulation. Even the envy they ex-
cite in their rivals is delicious, if not
almost necessary to them.
Margaret's real nature had not been
| changed by a success that had been
altogether phenomenal and had prob
| ably not been approached by any
soprano since Nine. Bonanni; but
| second nature had grown upon it and
threatened to hide it from all but
those who knew her very well indeed.
The inward Margaret was honest and
brave, rather sensitive, and still gener-
GUS; the outward woman, the prima
donna whom most people saw, was
self-possessed to a fault, imperious
when contradicted, and coolly ruthless
| when her artistic fame was at stake.
The two natures did not agree we'll
| together and made her wretched when
| aNr -r1n II I,,N I 4.
was going to take her for better, for
worse, professed to like them both,
and was the only man she had ever
known who did. That was one reason
why she was going to marry him, aft
er having refused him about a dozen
| times.
She had loved another man as much
as she was capable of loving, and at
one time he had loved her, but a mis-
understanding and her devotion to her
art had temporarily separated them;
and iatar, when she had almost told
him that she would have him if he
asked her, he had answered her quite
frankly that she was no longer the
girl he had cared for, and he lad sud.
denly disappeared from her life alto
gether. So Logotheti, brilliant, very
: rich, gifted, gay, and rather exotic in
appearance and manner, but tenaci
GUS as a bloodhound, had won the
} prize after struggle that had lasted
: two years. She had accepted him
without much enthusiasm at the last
and without any great show of feel
ing.
Let's try it," she had said, and ht
had been more than satisfied.
After a time, therefore, they tolt
} their friends that they were going t
try it,"
/ The only woman with whom tn,
; great singer was at all intimate wal
the Countess Leven, Lord Creedmorei
! daughter, generally called Lad,
( Maud" whose husband had been II
/ the diplomacy, and, after vainly try
/ ing to divorce her, had been killed II
? St. Petersburg by a bomb meant 70
: a minister. The explosion had beef
so terrific that the dead mans identit.
+ had only been established by mean
e of his pocket-book, which somehow es
3 capped destruction. So Lady Alau
y was a childless widow OF eight-and
E twenty. Her father, when he had n
. prospect of ever succeeding to tn
5 title, had been a successful barristel
e and then Woodworking member O
; parliament, and he had been from boy
! hood the close friend of Margaret
father. Hence the intimacy that gre,
j. up quickly between the two wome
8 when they at last met, though the
r had not known each other as children
0 because the lawyer had lived in tow
/, and his friend in Oxford.
1 so you're going to try 1t. m
I dear!" said Lady Maud. when sh
8 heard the news