The Boys' Life of Mark Twain Part 29

LVI.

HONORED BY MISSOURI

The family did not return to New York. They took a beautiful house at Riverdale on the Hudson--the old Appleton homestead. Here they established themselves and settled down for American residence. They would have bought the Appleton place, but the price was beyond their reach.

It was in the autumn of 1901 that Mark Twain settled in Riverdale. In June of the following year he was summoned West to receive the degree of LL.D. from the university of his native state. He made the journey a sort of last general visit to old a.s.sociations and friends. In St. Louis he saw Horace Bixby, fresh, wiry, and capable as he had been forty-five years before. Clemens said:

"I have become an old man. You are still thirty-five."

They went over to the rooms of the pilots' a.s.sociation, where the river-men gathered in force to celebrate his return. Then he took train for Hannibal.

He spent several days in Hannibal and saw Laura Hawkins--Mrs. Frazer, and a widow now--and John Briggs, an old man, and John RoBards, who had worn the golden curls and the medal for good conduct. They drove him to the old house on Hill Street, where once he had lived and set type; photographers were there and photographed him standing at the front door.

"It all seems so small to me," he said, as he looked through the house.

"A boy's home is a big place to him. I suppose if I should come back again ten years from now it would be the size of a bird-house." He did not see "Huck"--Torn Blankenship had not lived in Hannibal for many years. But he was driven to all the familiar haunts--to Lover's Leap, the cave, and the rest; and Sunday afternoon, with John Briggs, he walked over Holliday's Hill--the "Cardiff Hill" of "Tom Sawyer." It was just such a day, as the one when they had damaged a cooper shop and so nearly finished the old negro driver. A good deal more than fifty years had pa.s.sed since then, and now here they were once more--Tom Sawyer and Joe Harper--two old men, the hills still fresh and green, the river rippling in the sun. Looking across to the Illinois sh.o.r.e and the green islands where they had played, and to Lover's Leap on the south, the man who had been Sam Clemens said:

"John, that is one of the loveliest sights I ever saw. Down there is the place we used to swim, and yonder is where a man was drowned, and there's where the steamboat sank. Down there on Lover's Leap is where the Millerites put on their robes one night to go to heaven. None of them went that night, but I suppose most of them have gone now."

John Briggs said, "Sam, do you remember the day we stole peaches from old man Price, and one of his bow-legged n.i.g.g.e.rs came after us with dogs, and how we made up our minds we'd catch that n.i.g.g.e.r and drown him?"

And so they talked on of this thing and that, and by and by drove along the river, and Sam Clemens pointed out the place where he swam it and was taken with a cramp on the return.

"Once near the sh.o.r.e I thought I would let down," he said, "but was afraid to, knowing that if the water was deep I was a goner, but finally my knee struck the sand and I crawled out. That was the closest call I ever had."

They drove by a place where a haunted house had stood. They drank from a well they had always known--from the bucket, as they had always drunk --talking, always talking, touching with lingering fondness that most beautiful and safest of all our possessions--the past.

"Sam," said John, when they parted, "this is probably the last time we shall meet on earth. G.o.d bless you. Perhaps somewhere we shall renew our friendship."

"John," was the answer, "this day has been worth a thousand dollars to me. We were like brothers once, and I feel that we are the same now.

Good-by, John. I'll try to meet you somewhere."

Clemens left next day for Columbia, where the university is located. At each station a crowd had gathered to cheer and wave as the train pulled in and to offer him flowers. Sometimes he tried to say a few words, but his voice would not come. This was more than even Tom Sawyer had dreamed.

Certainly there is something deeply touching in the recognition of one's native State; the return of the boy who has set out unknown to battle with life and who is called back to be crowned is unlike any other home-coming--more dramatic, more moving. Next day at the university Mark Twain, summoned before the crowded a.s.sembly-hall to receive his degree, stepped out to the center of the stage and paused. He seemed in doubt as to whether he should make a speech or only express his thanks for the honor received. Suddenly and without signal the great audience rose and stood in silence at his feet. He bowed but he could not speak. Then the vast a.s.sembly began a peculiar chant, spelling out slowly the word M-i-s-s-o-u-r-i, with a pause between each letter. It was tremendously impressive.

Mark Twain was not left in doubt as to what was required of him when the chant ended. The audience demanded a speech--a speech, and he made them one--such a speech as no one there would forget to his dying day.

Back in St. Louis, he attended the rechristening of the St. Louis harbor boat; it had been previously called the "St. Louis," but it was now to be called the "Mark Twain."

LVII.

THE CLOSE OF A BEAUTIFUL LIFE

Life which had begun very cheerfully at Riverdale ended sadly enough. In August, at York Harbor, Maine, Mrs. Clemens's health failed and she was brought home an invalid, confined almost entirely to her room. She had been always the life, the center, the mainspring of the household. Now she must not even be consulted--hardly visited. On her bad days--and they were many--Clemens, sad and anxious, spent most of his time lingering about her door, waiting for news, or until he was permitted to see her for a brief moment. In his memorandum-book of that period he wrote:

"Our dear prisoner is where she is through overwork--day and night devotion to the children and me. We did not know how to value it.

We know now."

And on the margin of a letter praising him for what he had done for the world's enjoyment, and for his triumph over debt, he wrote:

"Livy never gets her share of those applauses, but it is because the people do not know. Yet she is ent.i.tled to the lion's share."

She improved during the winter, but very slowly. Her husband wrote in his diary:

"Feb. 2, 1903--Thirty-third wedding anniversary. I was allowed to see Livy five minutes this morning, in honor of the day."

Mrs. Clemens had always remembered affectionately their winter in Florence of ten years before, and she now expressed the feeling that if she were in Florence again she would be better. The doctors approved, and it was decided that she should be taken there as soon as she was strong enough to travel. She had so far improved by June that they journeyed to Elmira, where in the quiet rest of Quarry Farm her strength returned somewhat and the hope of her recovery was strong.

Mark Twain wrote a story that summer in Elmira, in the little octagonal study, shut in now by trees and overgrown with vines. "A Dog's Tale," a pathetic plea against vivisection, was the last story written in the little retreat that had seen the beginning of "Tom Sawyer" twenty-nine years before.

There was a feeling that the stay in Europe was this time to be permanent. On one of the first days of October Clemens wrote in his note-book:

"To-day I place flowers on Susy's grave--for the last time, probably --and read the words, 'Good night, dear heart, good night, good night.'"

They sailed on the 24th, by way of Naples and Genoa, and were presently installed in the Villa Reale di Quarto, a fine old Italian palace, in an ancient garden looking out over Florence toward Vallombrosa and the Chianti hills. It was a beautiful spot, though its aging walls and cypresses and matted vines gave it a rather mournful look. Mrs.

Clemens's health improved there for a time, in spite of dull, rainy, depressing weather; so much so that in May, when the warmth and sun came back, Clemens was driving about the country, seeking a villa that he might buy for a home.

On one of these days--it was a Sunday in early June, the 5th--when he had been out with Jean, and had found a villa which he believed would fill all their requirements, he came home full of enthusiasm and hope, eager to tell the patient about the discovery. Certainly she seemed better. A day or two before she had been wheeled out on the terrace to enjoy the wonder of early Italian summer.

He found her bright and cheerful, anxious to hear all their plans for the new home. He stayed with her alone through the dinner hour, and their talk was as in the old days. Summoned to go at last, he chided himself for staying so long; but she said there was no harm and kissed him, saying, "you will come back?" and he answered "Yes, to say good night,"

meaning at half-past nine, as was the permitted custom. He stood a moment at the door, throwing kisses to her, and she returned them, her face bright with smiles.

He was so full of hope--they were going to be happy again. Long ago he had been in the habit of singing jubilee songs to the children. He went upstairs now to the piano and played the chorus and sang "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot," and "My Lord He Calls Me." He stopped then, but Jean, who had come in, asked him to go on. Mrs. Clemens, from her room, heard the music and said to Katy Leary:

"He is singing a good-night carol to me."

The music ceased presently. A moment later she asked to be lifted up.

Almost in that instant life slipped away without a sound.

Clemens, just then coming to say good-night, saw a little group gathered about her bed, and heard Clara ask:

"Katy, is it true? Oh, Katy, is it true?"

In his note-book that night he wrote:

"At a quarter-past nine this evening she that was the life of my life pa.s.sed to the relief and the peace of death, after twenty-two months of unjust and unearned suffering. I first saw her thirty-seven years ago, and now I have looked upon her face for the last time....

I was full of remorse for things done and said in these thirty- four years of married life that have hurt Livy's heart."

And to Howells a few days later:

"To-day, treasured in her worn, old testament, I found a dear and gentle letter from you dated Far Rockaway, September 12, 1896, about our poor Susy's death. I am tired and old; I wish I were with Livy."

They brought her to America; and from the house, and the rooms, where she had been made a bride bore her to a grave beside Susy and little Langdon.