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Back in the Lake Shore mansion, Mrs. McCormick never spent a night out of it until she went to a hospital in 1930. No guest ever spent a night in it. She became more imperious, more eccentric. She practiced astrology, celebrated Christmas on December 15. She believed in reincarnation, decided she had been King Tutankhamen's child-wife Anknesenpaaten. "Then they opened the mummy chamber and when I saw the pictures of it, I knew. There was my little chair." She wrote the words to a Love Song Cycle and a play in Italian, collected Persian rugs. She took daily walks, always over the same route. When someone suggested another route she said: "It doesn't matter. I am not really here." She developed phobias, kept six detectives in the house. She feared water, seldom bathed. Like Anknesenpaaten, she was not buried. Her body was put in a receiving vault next to that of her son John, which had been there for 31 years, the cemetery people never having had any instructions what to do.
Her son Fowler had married Mrs. Anne Urquhart ("Fifi") Stillman, 19 years his senior; her daughter Muriel, Major Elisha Dyer Hubbard, 24 years her senior; her daughter Mathilde, Swiss Riding Master Max Oser, 30 years her senior. Each of these marriages upset her. In her will she left Muriel only four-twelfths of her estate. Mathilde two-twelfths, faithful Fowler only one-twelfth.
All the rest she gave to curious Edwin Krenn. Upon him she had depended entirely in her fading years. She forced him upon Chicago society, planned with him a $45,000,000 empire of realty. Last year she had to sell $18,000,000 in securities to protect her small householders. The faithful Krenn threw in his all—$1,260,000. Her brother John was said to have guaranteed her $1,000 a day for life, but neither he nor his father could swallow Krenn.
Last week came one more ironic twist in her story, about which she never knew. Krenn's business partner was a Russian, Edward A. Dato about whom Chicago knew nothing until last week when, bristling and important, he explained to newshawks :
"Krenn and I went to school together in Zurich. His family liked him to associate with me. . . . Then I came to this country. I worked for the International Harvester Co. as a consulting engineer. One day in the papers I read of Mrs. McCormick's divorce. The papers mentioned Krenn. I think: That is my schoolmate. I will look him up. . . . Mrs. McCormick wanted to put her money into civic projects which would be great things for the community. Of course it was against my wishes that I was drawn into it. We formed a trust, the three of us. Mrs. McCormick and Krenn said to me: 'Here is $5,000,000 to start with.' Krenn carried on the social end of it. I carried on the practical end."
He said that a few days before Mrs. McCormick died he had bought from Krenn, for $2,000 a month for life, his five-twelfths share of the estate and his interest in Krenn & Dato. Asked a newshawk: "Why?"
"That is a delicate matter. Krenn was not friendly with the Rockefeller or the McCormick families. It was for the good of the firm. I will attend to the business. I am a fighter. I like to be in the thick of things. I like to take a chance. I like to make decisions. Maybe I am like Mussolini. . ."