Having accompanied Mr. Clemens on an extensive lecture tour, I knew many of his routines of old. But here, as on his riverboat lectures, he made an effort to introduce new material appropriate to the audience and the occasion. So he gave us a sketch in which he imagined Noah trying to persuade a strict German inspector to certify the Ark as seaworthy. His imitation of a German accent had Prinz Karl (in a choice front-row seat) nearly falling from his chair with laughter. He repeated, with ludicrous embellishments, his tall tale of the ship cemented to the sea bottom by barnacles. And he told of his first Atlantic voyage, on the tour ship Quaker City, comparing its primitive conditions to the luxury of a modern liner like City of Baltimore—taking the occasion to compliment both our captain and the ship itself, to much applause from both passengers and crew.
I had wondered whether the recent scandals would hurt the attendance at the lectures, but that did not seem to be the case. Mr. Mercer was of course absent, presumably under guard; so were the three crewmen he had bribed to intimidate Robert Babson before he lost control of his temper. Neither was I surprised that Julius Babson, the victim’s father, was absent, along with the rest of his family. Learning that his old friend had so thoroughly betrayed and misled him must have been a terrible shock. I wondered whether the rumor that Babson might decide to remain in Europe to avoid prosecution for his supposed offenses might not turn out to be well-founded.
If so, what would his daughter Rebecca do? Would she remain in Europe, or return home to take her fate in her own hands? I hoped at least to speak to her again before we landed in England and went our separate ways. It seemed my fate to meet attractive young women on my journeys with Mr. Clemens—many of whom I would have welcomed the opportunity to know better. But between the constant travel and the strange circumstances that had involved my employer (and, perforce, myself) in a series of murder investigations, none of the relationships had progressed beyond the stage of casual acquaintance. Perhaps this was only the natural consequence of my decision to pursue a traveling life rather than the sort of steady profession my parents urged upon me. If so, I was willing to accept my side of the bargain.
In the intermission between the two lectures—perhaps twenty minutes, just enough time for Mr. Clemens to rest his voice—I went to join him “backstage.” This was actually a nearby room normally used for small meetings, where he could sit down and drink a glass of water between the two lectures. “How’d it look out front?” he asked me.
I assured him that it was going very well—which was the truth. I had never seen him have the slightest difficulty winning over a crowd, though he had as many trepidations before a performance as any rank amateur going on the stage.
“Well, I did the best I could on short notice,” he said, visibly relaxing. “Do you think very many people will stay to see the second lecture? Should I try to change it?”
“The room almost completely emptied out when you were done,” I said. He looked startled by this, so I hastily added, “It was the captain’s doing. He jumped up on stage and ordered everyone out so there would be room for those who wanted to see the second show. So don’t worry about any repeaters except Mrs. Tremont—and me. We won’t be at all disappointed if you repeat yourself verbatim, I’m sure.”
“All right—I want it to be a good show,” Mr. Clemens said. He was about to say something else, but was interrupted by a knock at the door. “Who’s that?” he wondered. “Go answer it, will you?”
I opened the door to discover Michael Richards and his sister, Susan Martin. “Hello,” said Mr. Richards. “Does Mr. Clemens have a few minutes before he has to give his lecture?”
“For two old friends, sure I do,” said Mr. Clemens, rising to his feet. “Come on in and chat a bit—it seems as if I’ve seen you every time I turn around, but I’ve been so busy I’ve hardly had time to talk to anybody.”
“Yes, you certainly have been busy,” agreed Mrs. Martin brightly. Mr. Clemens showed her to a seat, and she looked up at him and said, “We’ve had an awfully hard time trying to keep up with you.”
Mr. Clemens’s eyes narrowed. “Wait a minute—you two have been just about everywhere I’ve been, lately. Don’t tell me it hasn’t been a coincidence—that you’ve been following me!”
Mr. Richards laughed. “Yes, I’m afraid we have been. That’s why we wanted to come see you—partly to explain, and partly to apologize.”
Mr. Clemens looked puzzled. “Explain? Apologize? I could certainly use some explanations. But I don’t know what you’ve done that needs an apology—not yet, at least.”
Mrs. Martin smiled. “When Michael and I learned that you were on board, we ended up chatting about the old days, and how we’d both thought we’d grow up to become writers, because of you. Of course, things didn’t work out that way. I have my marriage, and Michael has his career, and time flies—as I’m sure you know.”
“But meeting you made us think, Why not now?” said Michael Richards. “We’ve got a long ocean voyage, and plenty of time in Europe. Since your first book was about your adventures in Europe, perhaps we could do the same sort of thing. So we sat down and began working on it, although at first we weren’t quite sure what to write about.”
“Yes, that’s always the hard part,” said Mr. Clemens, looking from brother to sister in some perplexity.
“Well, you can’t imagine how pleased we were when we learned there had possibly been a murder on board,” said Mrs. Martin. She saw my shocked expression, and her hand flew to her mouth as she realized what she’d said. “Oh, dear! Of course I don’t mean that we were pleased because the poor boy was dead, but because now we had something to write about. And it didn’t take us long to figure out that you were trying to solve the mystery.”
“We’d heard about the mysteries you’d solved back in America,” said her brother. “So we decided to spy on you and see how you managed to solve this one. And of course, that meant following Mr. Cabot here, as well.”
“You’ve been spying on us?” I said. Now I was as puzzled as Mr. Clemens. I had noticed the two passengers in my vicinity several times, but now, casting my mind back over the last few days, it did seem that one or the other had made an appearance far more often than chance would allow.
“Yes, and that’s what we came to apologize about,” said Mrs. Martin. “We couldn’t let you know while we were doing it, because you might have tried to evade us. Of course, now that you’ve solved the mystery, we won’t need to do it anymore. But now we have such a fascinating story to tell—it gives our book all the interest we could possibly have hoped for. And we hope you’ll be so kind as to take the time to tell us all about your investigation before we dock in England. We want to get it right in our report.”
“Good Lord,” said Mr. Clemens, shaking his head in disbelief. “I’ve been a character in a book before, but it’s always been in my own books. I hope it isn’t too much to ask you to send me a copy? I’ll send you back a copy of my next book in exchange.”
“We’d be delighted to send you a copy,” said Mrs. Martin. “It’s the least we can do for the man who made us believe that we could be writers—and who gave us all our best material. And we certainly look forward to your new books—we try to buy them all when they come out.”
“Good, then it’s a deal,” said Mr. Clemens, shaking hands with the brother and sister. “Well, I’m glad you let me in on your little secret.” He laughed, and then a twinkle came into his eye. “Now let me tell you my little secret. I noticed you two hanging around—it seemed you were right there every time Wentworth or I were about to pick up some clue or another. I thought the only reason you’d be watching me so closely was that you were up to your ears in the whole mess—so for a while you two were on my list of suspects! I never could figure out your motive, but if I had, you two would have been in the brig!”
Mrs. Martin’s eyes grew big, and Mr. Richards began to sputter, protesting his innocence. Then the sister laughed, and put her arm around her brother
’s shoulder. “Well, Michael, I think we’ve just had our legs pulled. I suppose we shouldn’t expect anything else from Mark Twain. But we’ll get back at him—just wait till he sees what we say about him in our book!”
Mr. Clemens chuckled. “I reckon it’ll be a real eye-opener to see what I look like to somebody else. I hope the resemblance is close enough to for me to recognize. If it’s close enough, maybe I’ll get rid of my mirror, and use it to shave by.”
Mrs. Martin smiled broadly. “Do you see, Michael? He hasn’t changed a bit.”
“I certainly hope not,” said Mr. Richards. “It would be a shame to learn he’d changed all his best stories, just when we’ve gotten old enough to stay and listen to them!”
There was another knock on the door; I opened it to find Mr. and Mrs. Kipling. “Come on in,” said Mr. Clemens. “If we get a few more, I can give my lecture right here.”
“I’d advise against,” said Mr. Kipling, with a chuckle. “The Grand Saloon is close to full, and I wouldn’t be surprised if you could fill it up a third time. We asked Colonel Fitzwilliam to save us seats. But I thought you’d like to hear the latest news. Mr. Jennings tells me that Signor Rubbia is conscious, and he has apparently recanted his claim that the prince was the killer. I think he’s ready to tell all.”
“Good,” said Mr. Clemens. “That ought to wrap up all the loose ends. And I’m just as glad the captain’s only got one murder to account to his directors for. Of course, I’ll put in a good word for him and for Jennings—they both did their best, and none of what’s happened should be held against them.”
He reached in his pocket and pulled out his watch. “Now, I guess you’d better go grab whatever seats are left, if you want to see the show. It’s almost time, anyhow.”
“Oh, we’ve seen quite a show already,” said Mrs. Martin, with a bright smile. “We won’t be a bit disappointed, even if we don’t get seats tonight.”
Mr. Clemens stood and stretched. “I reckon this is the last time I’ll think of an ocean voyage as a chance to relax. What with a murderer to catch, and entertaining the guests at the captain’s table every night, and two shows on a Saturday, I’ve been working overtime, and my wallet not one cent the fatter for it. It’ll be a wonder if they don’t have to put me in bed for a week, once we land in England.”
I opened the door to let our guests file out, then turned to Mr. Clemens. “Your wife and daughters would be quite disappointed if you were to collapse the minute you were reunited with them,” I said.
“No, they know me too well to be surprised at anything I do,” replied Mr. Clemens. “But for Livy and the girls, I think I can manage to stay awake. Now, let’s go see whether I can keep an audience awake when I’m about to fall asleep myself. It’ll be a hard test.”
As I would have predicted, he passed it with flying colors.
[Mark Twain Mysteries 03] - The Prince and the Prosecutor Page 33