A fond old mother, knocking on the door, comes always in time to stop these brain-destroying paroxysms.

“And to think, mother, that they shall asperse his name!  The people’s idol!  Faugh!  The people!  Oh, mother, mother!”

The mother deplores these months of persistent brooding.  It is wrong.

“So they always say, who have not suffered, mother.  How fortunate you are.”

But the daughter must recollect that to-day is the dedication.  A band has marched past.  Kind friends have carried the subscription to undoubted success.  Emery Storrs will deliver the oration.  The papers are full of the programme, the line of march, the panegyric.  There are many delicate references to the faithful widow, who has devoted her husband’s estate and as much more to the erection of a vast fire-proof annex at a leading hospital.

The public ear is well pleased.  The names of the men who have led in the memorial of to-day are rolled on everybody’s tongue.

There appears at the scene of dedication a handsome woman.  Her smile, though wofully sad, is sweet and sympathetic.  She humbly and graciously thanks all the prominent citizens, who receive her assurances as so much accustomed tribute.  The trowel rings.  The soprano sings.  The orator is at his best.  Band after band takes up its air.  The march begins again.  Chicago is gratified.  The great day ends with a banquet to the prominent citizens by the political leader.

The slander that republics and communities are ungrateful is hurled in the faces of the base caitiffs who have given it currency.

Behind all the gratulations of conventionality—­in the unprinted, unreported, unconventional world—­the devotion of Esther Lockwin is universally remarked upon.

Learned editors, noting this phase of the matter, discuss the mausoleums of Asia erected by loving relicts and score a point in journalism.

“The widow of the late Hon. David Lockwin, M. C., will soon sail for Europe,” says the society paper.

But she will do no such thing.  She will spend her nights and mornings lamenting her widowhood.  She will be present every day to see that the work goes forward on the monument.

“I might die,” she says, moodily.

There will be no cessation of labor at the ascending column.  It is not in the order of things here that a committee should go to Springfield to urge an unwilling public conclusion of a grateful private beginning.  Money pours like water.  The memorial rises.  It becomes a city lion.  It is worth going to see.

Society waits with becoming patience.  “Inasmuch as the prominent citizens saw fit to render Esther’s sorrow conspicuous,” says Mrs. Grundy, “it is perfectly decent that she should remain in complete retirement.”

Nevertheless notice is secretly served on the entire matrimonial world.

Esther Lockwin will soon be worth not a penny less than five million dollars!