Oscar Hijuelos - Twain & Stanley Enter Paradise

Yours always,

Dolly

June 1, 1903

Dearest Lady Dolly,

I am truly sorry to hear about Stanley’s illness; believe me, I can commiserate, for we are both tethered to the same burden of seeing a loved one suffer. As you know, Livy has been laid low these past few years — with gout, a weak heart, and a general malaise of the spirit that has its origins in Susy’s passing and our daughter Jean’s worsening epilepsy and fainting spells. Worries about Jean’s condition have been a great drain on Livy, and so as a rule we have tried to keep Jean’s continuing seizures a secret. Our decision to finally sell our old house in Hartford has not helped matters, because it is filled with Susy’s spirit. It is impossible for us to return there — we closed on the sale, at a considerable loss, just a few weeks ago — but I am also much vexed by the fact that some doctors seem to think my moods have somehow aggravated Livy’s condition of “nervous prostration.” And so for a good part of the past seven months I have only been allowed to see her for a few minutes a day — and sometimes not at all. Even when I do visit her, the nurse stands by with a stopwatch, restricting me to two minutes a day. On our wedding anniversary we were allowed five minutes, and just this past February, when Livy seemed to improve somewhat, this was increased to fifteen minutes — though by then our Riverdale house had been turned into something of a sick ward. Back in December, Jean had come down with pneumonia (which we kept a secret from Livy) and then, once she finally recovered, both Clara and Jean came down with measles and our house was quarantined; it was one of those ironies that on top of it all, even as Livy seemed to improve, yours truly fell into an agony of toothaches, bronchitis, and rheumatism, all of which left me in bed for five weeks. It was only a few weeks ago that I was up and about again.

In the meantime, Livy has been well enough for our servants to occasionally bring her downstairs to our front lawn to take in the sun; and although she cannot get around without a wheelchair, it is our hope that a change of scenery to a warmer clime may help extend her life. We have been considering a move to sunny Italy, perhaps by the fall, if she is well enough to endure the crossing. But am I optimistic or hopeful? The truth is that my wife is slowly dying — that is clear to us all — and as a result, when I contemplate it I am drawn to the conclusion that sooner or later, in a sunny clime or not, I will become one of the loneliest men in the world.

Forgive my maudlin ramblings — I turned sixty-seven last autumn, and if I cannot be frank at this time of my life, when will I ever be? I am feeling more than a little upset to hear about Stanley; I hope you do not mind that I did not share your letter with Livy, for I know she would be greatly saddened to hear about him, and that is why she has not written to you herself. I am simply trying to protect her from anything that would bring further aches to her heart. Stanley remains one of the lights we both look to, and whatever controversies have swirled about him in recent times, I think him a very great man and count myself lucky that he is a good friend. So when he comes around, as I am sure he will, please tell him that Samuel Clemens looks forward to the day when the two of us will sit out in some sunny place, sipping drinks and swapping stories.

And please do keep us apprised of Stanley’s health, as I will keep you informed about Livy.

With all best wishes and love,

S. L. Clemens

THE MONTHS PASSED, and slowly Stanley began to come around, an improvement that Dolly attributed to the stream of spiritualist healers whom she had brought to his bedside — their hands passing over the ailing magnetic fields of his body, their voices summoning the spirits of the great healers of the past to breathe new life into him — or perhaps he had been heartened by the continuous attentions of Dolly herself, who rarely left his bedside and often spoke to him sweetly or read aloud from his favorite books. Denzil, too, entirely bewildered by his father’s condition but obedient to his mother’s wishes, sat with him for at least an hour a day. Then, after many weeks of the deepest unconsciousness, some movement came back to him: He could open his left eye, had some feeling in that hand, and slowly began to emerge from the dark and claustrophobic room. With the movement of his eyes, there slowly returned the faculty of his speech, although his words were slurred and labored.

His first full phrase consisted of a question: “Where am I?”

“Oh, Stanley, my love, you are at home, safe and sound!”

“Safe and sound?”

“Yes, my love!”

“But is this Cairo?”

“No, you are home, at Furze Hill.”

And he looked at Dolly with confusion, having trouble recognizing her.

“And you are?”

“I am your wife, Dorothy.”

“So I am married? How did that come to be?”

“Oh, Stanley, do you not remember? We have been wedded now for thirteen years!” And she pulled the boy close to his side. “This lovely cherub is your son, Denzil. And look there, through the windows: You will see the spreading meadows and woods — they are yours, as is everything you see around you.”

“Ah, yes, I suppose that is so.” Then: “What’s happened to me?”

“You’ve fallen ill.”

“From malaria?”

“No, my love; you have suffered from a different kind of affliction.”

“And you say that my name is Stanley?”

“Yes! Henry Morton Stanley.”

“Why does it seem odd to me?”

“Because you have been ill.”

And when he turned away sadly, Dolly, in her most hopeful and cheerful manner, said: “The main thing is that you are getting well! And if you do not remember everything clearly now, it will all come back to you, day by day; that I promise you.”

BY LATE JUNE, HAVING RECOVERED his memory and most of his faculties, he was well enough to be carried downstairs from his sickbed in an invalid’s chair to take in the sun on his lawn at Furze Hill. Once out through the entry hall’s door into the open air, he nearly wept from joy. It was a glorious day, teeming with life: a flight of sparrows flocking across the woods; the tapping of woodpeckers and the churning of a brook sounding from a forest hollow in the distance; a monarch butterfly dallying over a rose. In the fields, some of his men, a hearty crew, were digging out a well. Cows, sheep, and horses lolled in a meadow; dogs were barking; his farmhands were going about their business in attending to the estate. And around him — everywhere, he supposed, in the very radiance of life itself — was God’s unseen presence, of which the miracle of the world’s existence in those moments was proof enough.

Although he was no mystic, his stroke had left him predisposed to wild imaginings, for whereas before he had once looked at the horizon and saw it, geographically speaking, coming to an end, in whatever direction he now looked Stanley fantasized that he could follow the terrain beyond its apparent boundaries, as if, radiant with divinity and the promise of youth, he could roam the world from his chair. Though he could not move without assistance, for he did not yet have the strength to wheel himself about, he spent many a day reveling in mental adventures, the likes of which he had not experienced since he was a boy and dreamed of following the road out from St. Asaph’s to the rest of England. Just looking out at the horizon brought back the wanderlust that had driven him throughout his life — how else could he have journeyed so far and wide? He felt blessed to have seen so much of the world, and whether it had been good or bad, he reckoned that he had experienced more than most men ever would. If he felt sad at all, it was out of a longing for the days when the future was a mystery to be pursued and explored.