“How nice it is of you, Mr. Lyon—­may I call you so, to bring back the old relations?—­to come here and revive the memory of the dear old days when we were all innocent and happy!  Dear me, I used to think I could patronize that little country girl from Brandon!  I was so worldly—­don’t you remember?—­and she was so good.  And now she is such a splendid woman, it is difficult for the rest of us to keep pace with her.  The nerve she has, and the things she will do!  I just envy her.  I sometimes think she will drive me into a convent.  And don’t you think she is more beautiful than ever?  Of course her face is a little careworn, but nobody makes up as she does; she was just ravishing the other night.  Do you know, I think she takes her husband too seriously.”

“I trust she is happy,” the earl had said.

“Why shouldn’t she be?” Carmen asked in return.  “She has everything she wants.  They both have a little temper; life would be flat without that; she is a little irritable sometimes; she didn’t use to be; and when they don’t agree they let each other alone for a little.  I think she is as happy as anybody can be who is married.  Now you are shocked!  Well, I don’t know any one who is more in love than she is, and that may be happiness.  She is becoming exactly like Mr. Henderson.  You couldn’t ask anything more than that.”

If Margaret were really happy, the earl told Miss Forsythe, he was glad, but it was scarcely the career he would have thought would have suited her.

Meantime, the great house was approaching completion.  Henderson’s palace, in the upper part of the city, had long been a topic for the correspondents of the country press.  It occupied half a square.  Many critics were discontented with it because it did not occupy the whole square.  Everybody was interested in having it the finest residence on the continent.  Why didn’t Henderson take the whole block of ground, build his palace on three sides, with the offices and stables on the fourth, throw a glass roof over the vast interior court, plant it with tropical trees and plants, adorn it with flower-beds and fountains, and make a veritable winter-garden, giving the inhabitants a temperate climate all the cold months?  He might easily have summer in the centre of the city from November to April.  These rich people never know what to do with their money.  Such a place would give distinction to the city, and compel foreigners to recognize the high civilization of America.  A great deal of fault was found with Henderson privately for his parsimony in such a splendid opportunity.

Nevertheless it was already one of the sights of the town.  Strangers were taken to see it, as it rose in its simple grandeur.  Local reporters made articles on the progress of the interior whenever they could get an entrance.  It was not ornate enough to please, generally, but those who admired the old Louvre liked the simplicity of its lines and the dignity of the elevations.  They discovered the domestic note in its quiet character, and said that the architect had avoided the look of an “institution” in such a great mass.  He was not afraid of dignified wall space, and there was no nervous anxiety manifested, which would have belittled it with trivial ornamentation.