Wasn't there a story about a sorrowing jilted lover who decided to kill himself in a spectacular way? (And in front of his ex and her new love). Something about putting a rope around his neck, setting himself on fire and shooting himself with a shotgun as he jumped off a cliff. Supposedly he missed with the gun but shot through the rope so he fell all the way down to the lake which put out the fire, but then he drowned.

There's definitely a song there somewhere.

BTW the Neiman-Marcus story has an amusing footnote. The store here in Dallas has been quick to point out that

a. They did not at the time take VISA.

b. They do not sell recipes, but give them to anyone who asks.

c. There was not a cookie on the menu anyway.

The footnote is that there has been such a stir about the famous Neiman Marcus cookie that they NOW have one (but not the recipe that has been published as theirs).

Supposedly this story was told about some place back east about a hundred years ago. The Parker House in Boston???