ABSTRACT
However, before Oxygen was ready, a big part of Lydias life came to an end. On 1 February 1886, Alexander Henderson died. He had been unwell. In 1882 he had suffered a stroke, in 1885 it seems a second, which had left some traces. But he had not seemed in danger of his life. In the last days of January, he set out for a bit of a holiday in the south of France, apparently alone. The days of the dollybirds, it seems, were past, and he had sold his steam yacht to Henry Farnie. As he got down from the channel-crossing ship at Calais, he missed his now slightly unsteady footing and fell heavily. He was very much shaken and a dislocated ankle was feared. He continued his trip, however, and installed himself at the Prince des Galles Hotel in the sunny town of Cannes. But the southern French warmth and the peace and quiet of the pretty little town of Cannes did not do their work, and at six o’clock in the morning on the first of February he died in his hotel room.
