Two in the Field (12 page)

Walking past thick beds of red clover as I neared the mansion, I noted its polychrome roof tiles and huge veranda shaped like a pilot-house. Twain had built his dream house after cashing in big on
The Innocents Abroad
and
Roughing It
. It also hadn’t hurt that he’d married the daughter of a millionaire.

This time George showed me in immediately and Twain greeted me in the hallway. “Now you resemble the specimen I knew,” he said with a chuckle. “Dandified a bit.”

He was hardly one to talk, I thought, in his checked cutaway coat, striped trousers and green shirt—and his feet shod in weird house slippers made of animal skin with the fur outside.

Saying we would eat presently, he launched a tour of the premises. It commenced in his well-stocked library, and then moved to a towering glass conservatory replete with fountain, exotic plants, and even chirping crickets. The idea, Twain said, was for the family to enjoy nature in all seasons.

Most rooms were curtained and dark and furnished with heavy European pieces. Too somber for my taste. And too busy. Every inch of walls and ceilings was ornamented. Every shelf overflowed with knickknacks. I kept a rough count of bedrooms (nineteen), fireplaces (thirteen), and bathrooms (five). The latter boasted the latest indoor plumbing, with showers and flush toilets in place of the usual euphemistically-named “earth closets.” Twain boasted that his toilets were the first of their kind anywhere in a private residence.

On the second floor were the daughters’ bedrooms and a study destined to be a school room when they were older. On the third floor Twain showed off his glory, a long billiard room where he did most of his writing. Cues and balls were stenciled on the ceiling, intermixed with cigars and smoking pipes. George occupied the next room, convenient for being called out for a match in the wee hours when Twain couldn’t sleep.

“Seen one of these?” Twain pointed to a blocky typewriter. “When the drummer claimed it could do fifty-seven words a minute I accused him of telling stretchers. So he set his type girl to work. Glory be if she didn’t rattle off exactly fifty-seven words in sixty seconds. Clocked her myself and she did it again.” He shook his head dolefully. “I’ve worn my digits to the nubs but I’m still slower than chickens. Care to see me mix with it?”

He sat at the typewriter, handed me his pocket watch, and flexed his fingers. “I’ll perform ‘The Boy Stood on the Burning Deck.’ ” He took a breath. “Okay … go!” His arms flailed as he employed a hilarious two-finger poking technique that produced a metallic clatter.

“Time!”

He bent over the paper. “Right on the money!” he crowed. “Eighteen words! That’s
my
rate.”

I managed a straight face as I said, “Maybe with something other than ‘The Boy Stood on the Burning Deck,’ you’d be even faster.”

He looked puzzled. “But that’s all I’ve worked up.”

Again I kept from laughing. To Twain typing was like a piano piece to be perfected before performed. “I could show you the ‘touch system,’ ” I said. “With practice you’d triple your speed, even on text you’d never seen before.”

He looked at me narrowly but didn’t take the bait. “These type machines catch on, do they?”

“Oh, yes.”

“Well, I can claim to own one of the first.” He rummaged through papers and handed me some typed sheets. “I had a young woman copy a portion of my new book.”

My breath quickened as I scanned the pages. I held a famous rafting scene in which Tom and Huck are floating happily on the Mississippi.

“A boy’s tale so far,” he remarked. “But I may elect to let it mosey up into Tom’s manhood.”

I told him not to take it that far.

“Oh?” He regarded me archly. “Curious. Livy says the same.”

In that case she was a better critic than I’d argued in my J-school thesis. “Trust me,” I told him. “Tom
Sawyer
will turn out to be the most beloved of your books.”

He bristled. “You say I’m doing my peak work now?” he said indignantly. “Hell, I might as well shut down.”

“I said
beloved
. Your peak hasn’t come yet.”

“And that will be …?”

“Several possibilities,” I hedged, aware that he would consider
St. Joan
and
The Prince and the Pauper
his finest creations. Posterity would say
Huckleberry Finn
.

“That’s a pretty good dodge you’re working.” He squinted at me from under his bushy brows. “If you’re so cozy with what lies ahead, why didn’t you let on about that gold panic in ’69 that nearly finished us?”

“I don’t have total recall,” I protested. “Only what I happen to remember from studying history. Imagine yourself plopped back in, say, 1740. How’d you be on day-to-day events?”

“Hmmm … I take your point.” A distracted look came over his face. “If I sent a character back,” he said, “it would likely be to medieval times.”

I couldn’t resist. “King Arthur’s court?”

He gave me a startled glance and mumbled, “Might could be.”

The walls of the dining room looked like red leather burnished with gold. Twain said it was actually embossed paper. A marble-faced fireplace opposite the head of the table had a very odd feature: a window in the wall offering a view through the chimney.
“In winter,” he explained, “I like to see the flames licking up and snowflakes falling at the same time.”

“Mr. Clemens glories in his possessions,” said a quiet, cultured voice behind me. Olivia Clemens stood there with a little girl. As Twain made introductions I was struck again by Livy’s pale, almost luminous skin and intelligent gray-blue eyes. “We are pleased to have you join our little collation, Mr. Fowler.” Not dinner but
collation
. No hint that twenty-four hours earlier she’d seen me in a greatly altered condition.

“This
creature,” Twain said, as he tweaked Susy’s curls, “is Megalopis, the big-eyed character of Greek legend.”

“Oh, Papa.”

“Known familiarly as Susy.”

She had her mother’s dark brown hair, but with some of Twain’s bushiness and reddish tints. Unlike her parents, she did have huge eyes. Reflective, almost sad, those eyes. She would die in her twenties, I remembered, then thought of my own Susy, named for this one, and felt my heart lanced by a terrible, numbing sadness.

“Did Jesus change you?” she asked, her face intent.

“Beg pardon?”

“Did Jesus make you clean and nice so you could visit?”

“Susy!” said Livy.

“Like in Papa’s story,” she pressed, “about the ragged man who gets to be a prince?”

I tried to focus on the present. “I guess Jesus could have played a part.”

“He must love you.” She took my hand and guided me around the table to sit next to her. Captivated, I went willingly; the ache in my chest softened. “Just like he loves me.”

“Susy, you are … 
importunate,”
Livy chided.

The girl gave her mother the briefest of glances. “Last week I
painted pictures for Jesus,” she informed me. “But Mother said it was not allowed, because it was Sunday. Not even for Jesus.” Her eyes grew even larger. “Do you think it’s fair?”

“Young lady, that is enough,” said Livy.

George appeared from behind a screen and served roast duck on a bed of something Twain couldn’t identify. When George checked with the kitchen and reported that it was mashed chestnuts, Twain refused to eat his.

“Oh, Papa,” Susy said condescendingly.

“I understand you are from San Francisco, Mr. Fowler,” Livy said. We talked about the climate, which seemed to satisfy her, and Twain and I swapped stories of working for the
Chronicle
. His reportage occurred 140 years before mine, but I assumed that Livy didn’t know that.

Dessert was something called Nesselrode pudding, which involved a sauce of chopped and boiled chestnuts (which a grumbling Twain tried to pick out of his portion), maraschino cherries, candied fruit and rum. It was accompanied by ice cream molded into flower shapes. Afterward, we moved to the drawing room, where Twain puffed a cigar and we sipped sherry while Susy recited new poems she’d made up about the family’s large population of cats.

Later Twain plunked away on the piano as he sang spirituals: “Beulah Land” and “My Lord He Calls Me” and “Go Chain the Lion Down.” His twangy voice was surprisingly true, and carried heartfelt emotion. He said they were the first songs he’d heard, sung by slaves, and they’d gone straight to his soul.

“Do my favorite,” urged Susy.

So he sang about a horse, Methusalem, with verses that repeated into infinity. No telling how long he’d have continued if a tall Irish nanny hadn’t entered with year-old Clara, the Clemenses’ second daughter.

“Kiss your sister goodnight,” Livy told Susy. “It’s off to bed.”

“Come, Papa.”

Twain rose as commanded. “No telling what she’ll paste me with this time,” he muttered in mock irritation.

“Susy picks an object and Mr. Clemens makes a story about it,” Livy explained. “He says it taxes his brain to the melting point, but he wouldn’t miss it. At times I believe he loves that girl almost
too
much.” She indicated the bottle of sherry. “More?”

I watched her graceful movements as she replenished my glass. By now I had changed my original assessment. Livy radiated a calm loveliness. She
was
beautiful.

“My husband tells me that you are seeking the woman you wish to marry.”

Wish to marry?
I hadn’t thought about it like that, but …

“Yes, we’ve been separated,” I told her, “by circumstances.”

“I’m sure you’ll find her, Mr. Fowler,” she said soothingly. “Would you care to tell me of her?”

I described picnicking with Cait in Eden Park that first time. Nursing Timmy through typhoid fever. Giving her a pendant bearing two doves. And Cait turning the Claddaugh ring on her finger to show that her heart was taken.

“That’s lovely,” Livy said, her eyes shining.

Twain returned with a smug expression. “I worked a ghost in,” he said. “She was happy as pie.”

“Another ghost?” Livy said. “Must you?”

As they disputed mildly I envied them their love and their family bonds, and felt the sadness welling up again. What if I couldn’t find Cait? Then I would have sacrificed my previous life, my daughters, for nothing.

At length Livy put on reading glasses, stifled a yawn and murmured something about Twain’s writing. Each night, I remembered, she read and annotated his work.

“Time for me to go,” I said, rising.

Twain said I was welcome to stay in the conservatory wing where a large guest room, last occupied by Livy’s mother, was available for “visiting royalty.” It was tempting, but I didn’t want to impose. And I’d gotten what I’d wanted: to share in the atmosphere of this place. I told him I’d return to my hotel and try to hook up with the Red Stockings early the next morning.

“I trust you don’t plan to attend the match,” Twain said. “This whole town’s gone ball crazy. Excursion trains are coming in from Cleveland, Detroit, Brooklyn—all around. Our Dark Blues are 12-0 and Boston is 16-0. Seats sold out weeks ago.” He snapped his fingers. “Drat! Last night I gave Harte my other ticket. He doesn’t give a hang for the game. I’ll get it back, then we can go together.”

“ ‘Harte’ as in Bret Harte?”

“You know his work?” A prickly note suggested envy of Twain’s one-time mentor. “I reckon you would, out in Frisco.”

“He’s known,” I said, “but not like you are.”

Twain smiled and we arranged to meet before the game. He called for his stableman, a jovial Irishman named Patrick, to drive me into town. Sitting on the seat beside him, the night air brushing by us, listening to his lilting brogue, I felt a surge of excitement at the prospect of seeing Andy tomorrow.

He would direct me to Cait.

 EIGHT