A little later he was standing by the open window of his own room in the moonlight.
“My God!” he cried, burying his face in his hands, “this poor John Brooks did what I, her husband, should have done; but it is not too late now. I shall honor your memory, my 137 darling; I shall have a costly marble monument erected to your memory, bearing the inscription: ‘Sacred to the memory of Daisy, beloved wife of Rex Lyon, aged sixteen years.’ Not Daisy Brooks, but Daisy Lyon. Mother is dead, what can secrecy avail now?”
He would not tell Pluma until the last moment. Straightway he ordered a magnificent monument from Baltimore––one of pure unblemished white, with an angel with drooping wings overlooking the tall white pillar.
When it arrived he meant to take Pluma there, and, reverently kneeling down before her, tell her all the story of his sweet, sad love-dream with his face pressed close against the cold, pulseless marble––tell her of the love-dream which had left him but the ashes of dead hope. He sealed the letter and placed it with the out-going morning mail.
“Darling, how I wish I had not parted from you that night!” he sighed.
How bitterly he regretted he could not live that one brief hour of his past life over again––how differently he would act!
CHAPTER XXVIII.
While Rex was penning his all-important letter in his room, Pluma was walking restlessly to and fro in her boudoir, conning over in her mind the events of the evening.