OUT OF THE ASHES

BY
ETHEL WATTS MUMFORD


1913


I


Marcus Gard sat at his library table apparently in rapt contemplation of
a pair of sixteenth century bronze inkwells, strange twisted shapes,
half man, half beast, bearing in their breasts twin black pools. But his
thoughts were far from their grotesque beauty--centered on vast schemes
of destruction and reconstruction. The room was still, so quiet, in
spite of its proximity to the crowded life of Fifth Avenue, that one
divined its steel construction and the doubled and trebled casing of its
many windows. The walls, hung with green Genoese velvet, met a carved
and coffered ceiling, and touched the upper shelf of the breast-high
bookcases that lined the walls. No picture broke the simple unity of
color. Here and there a Donatello bronze silhouetted a slim shape, or a
Florentine portrait bust smiled with veiled meaning from the quiet
shadows. The shelves were rich in books in splendid bindings, gems of
ancient workmanship or modern luxury, for the Great Man had the instinct
of the masterpiece.

The door opened softly, and the secretary entered, a look of uncertainty
on his handsome young face. The slight sound of his footfall disturbed