Mark Twain's Other Woman

by Laura Skandera Trombley

  Jean apparently sent the letter after a frustrating conversation with Dr. Hunt. She was desperate to leave Hillbourne Farms at this point and furious that her feelings were not being taken into consideration. Three days later, Isabel met with Dr. Peterson, and afterward told Twain that Peterson felt Jean was making good progress despite “hating the sanitarium viciously” and that he was reluctant to change her care facility. What Dr. Peterson also told Isabel, which she wrote down but did not tell Twain, was that “the epileptic temperament rarely improved, but that it grew worse, & that Jean must never live with her father again, because her affection might easily turn into a violent & insane hatred & she could slay just by the sudden & terrible & ungovernable revulsion of feeling. The one bounding out of the other & the person never knowing that he is passing from one condition to the other.”

  Dr. Peterson’s account of Jean’s prognosis as an epileptic patient suffering from postictal psychosis constitutes a remarkably accurate contemporary description of the disease. After all, neurology was much more advanced than psychiatry at this time. Evidently Isabel decided that the description of a hopeless future for a twenty-eight-year-old woman would be too upsetting for a seventy-one-year-old man to hear, especially a man already prone to periods of depression and melancholy. Dr. Peterson felt strongly that Jean belonged in some kind of supervised institutional setting, and the only other one found appropriate was located in Greenwich, Connecticut. Jean had heard that the Greenwich sanitarium was not as nice as Hillbourne Farms and so she rejected that option. Jean spent her second Christmas away from family in Mount Vernon, New York, with friends she had made at the sanitarium. Her father’s Christmas present was sent through the mail—a check for $10.

  Hillbourne Farms exterior

  On Christmas Day, the Cowles sisters, Edith and Mildred, visited Twain to inquire if he would be willing to allow Jean to leave Hillbourne Farms, and to offer their assistance in a new living arrangement for her. The sisters had met Jean when a suicidal Mildred had entered Hillbourne Farms as a patient in November 1907. Edith had accompanied Mildred to watch over her. Isabel recorded Twain’s rather melodramatic response. “When the dear Cowles girls came here on Christmas day to see if Mr. Clemens would be willing to have Jean change from Katonah to Greenwich (& fearing to come) the King could not speak for a moment, & with his dear voice shaking he said ‘Anything, Anything you can do to make that dear child happy first, & then comfortable, you are privileged to do. I am a man. I can do so little for her.’” Isabel telephoned Jean with the promise of a wonderful Christmas gift and described the Cowleses’ idea. Jean was ecstatic: “Dr. Peterson is glad, she [Isabel] & Father delighted with the cottage idea & Clara is overjoyed too. She said she didn’t see how I had stood it as I had, etc. If they are happy, what am I.” Other patients shared Jean’s dislike of Hillbourne Farms, and there seems to have been a toxic air of hopelessness about the place. Considering what people were under treatment for and the futility of finding a cure for their affliction, it is hardly surprising.

  Jean’s departure finally came on January 9, 1908. She moved to Greenwich, not to the sanitarium, but rather to a private home at 57 Maple Avenue with Edith and Mildred as well as Marguerite Schmitt (nicknamed Bébé), a close friend. The plan was that Edith and Bébé would serve as Mildred and Jean’s nurses and Twain would underwrite their expenses. Twain and Isabel went to the train station in Katonah to bid farewell to Jean and were shocked by her appearance. Isabel described her as looking “very very ill. She is so white & her once beautiful face is so drawn; her fingers have a curious movement. She is like a drooping lily.” “Enraged” that her father had shown up unexpectedly, Jean told Isabel that seeing him had made her forget everything she needed to tell Isabel. The next day Jean suffered five seizures.

  While glad to have finally departed from Hillbourne Farms, Jean soon found her new living situation to be unmanageable. Mildred was still suicidal and occupied a great deal of her sister’s patience and time. Jean began to lobby for spending the summer in Dublin, and while Dr. Peterson initially thought well of the idea, his opinion ultimately changed. One reason might be found in a conversation Twain had in January with Mrs. Norman Hapgood, an old friend of the Clemens family, whose husband was the editor of Collier’s Weekly. Mrs. Hapgood told him that Jean had been heavily “criticized in Dublin when no one knew of her incriminating malady.” The insinuation was that had people known about her epilepsy, perhaps they might not have been so harsh in their judgment of her. Isabel also received a letter in February sent by Gra Thayer condemning Twain’s supposed neglect of Jean. Gra wrote: “We have been sore, though, at your King, for what has looked from outside like indifference about lonesome and afflicted & often misunderstood (??) brave pitiable beautiful Jean. That is butting in where sacred satyrs fear to butt; yet you know that Jean is fond of us & we of her, & that she doesn’t grant us quite the position of outsiders.” Isabel defensively responded to the Thayers: “The things that are merely seen from the outside are the things that are never understood. And that you should be sore with my king whose great wealth of love for Jean was never understood by her, could make me sad, but I rush to explain only this, that we who know the real inside, know that the misrepresentations are a part of Jean’s malady.”

  Twain might not have been anxious for Jean to return to Dublin and to be surrounded by wagging tongues, as well as to open himself up for criticism regarding her care. In the end, Dr. Peterson favored Gloucester, Massachusetts. He planned to visit the area during the summer, which would allow him to personally check on Jean, and he had confidence in a local physician. Peterson also thought the climate was healthy. At the end of March 1908, Peterson sent a letter to Twain with his Gloucester recommendation; Twain cabled his affirmative response. But when Jean, Mildred, Edith, and Bébé arrived in Gloucester in May, the situation continued to worsen, as Mildred’s self-destructive tendencies intensified, and Jean began to suspect that some of the money her father had been providing for their support was being used to mollify Edith. Another plan had to be devised for Jean, who probably felt at this point that she was condemned to wander for the remainder of her life.

  When Jean learned over the summer that Twain had decided to make Stormfield his permanent residence and that Isabel would live in the main house with him, she wrote to her close friend Nancy Brush with great excitement about the possibility of moving into Lyonesse: “Now Father thinks it would be a good place, anyway, because by being out of our house, I should have no difficulty in avoiding late entertainments & unhealthy goings-on & yet I could be near enough to see Father as often as permitted & have a healthy country life such as I need and want to have.” Yet Redding was not to be, as Dr. Peterson thought that, instead, expert treatment could be found in Berlin, Germany, with a Dr. Hofrath von Reuvers. Although initially conflicted, pleased about her upcoming voyage yet sad about not living near her father, Jean wrote Nancy that she was “wildly excited at the idea of going abroad again & of seeing Berlin—I saw it last when I was only eleven years old.”

  Jean’s surprise about going to Berlin was compounded by the fact that it was her father who had sent her the message: “Yesterday the news came like a thunderbolt from a clear sky. I came back from a long sail, just before lunch & found a letter from father. … When I read the opening sentence, I fairly gasped—if he had crawled out of the envelope, himself, I couldn’t have been any more amazed.” Fluent in German and a lover of all things European, Jean grew increasingly excited about her upcoming trip. At eleven o’clock in the morning on September 26, 1908, the Pretoria sailed for Germany. Isabel, Twain, and the Angelfish Dorothy Quick waved farewell to a “pathetic & wan” Jean, who was accompanied by her maid Anna Sterritt and Bébé Schmitt. While Jean found it a struggle to live within a budget of $50 a month—the amount allocated to her by her father—she was very happy in Berlin, and felt she was making excellent progress while under treatment by Dr. von Reuvers. After such a difficult and trying series
of living arrangements over a nearly two-year period, to all appearances a workable circumstance had finally been identified for Jean. In Berlin, she had found her treasured measure of independence, all the while being cared for by her friend and maid and under constant supervision by a world-class physician. And perhaps most comforting for her father, Jean was also far away from embarrassing gossip about her illness.

  4

  Redding’s newest and most famous resident quickly grew lonely and bored. Henry Rogers never visited his friend’s new home, as he had been in poor health for years. Twain was cheered by constant invitations from Rogers to come visit him in Fair Haven, Connecticut, where he kept his luxurious yacht the Kanawha, yet Twain’s fondness for Stormfield as well as his own sick turns kept him close to home. Despite the distance, the two men corresponded regularly and managed to maintain their close friendship, and Twain usually stayed with Rogers on his infrequent visits to New York City.

  By 1908, Twain’s attention to matters literary had begun to wander and the dictations for his autobiography had become infrequent, with only thirty-five in total for the year. In August, Josephine Hobby, the stenographer, was replaced with Mary L. Howden, and “Miss Mollie’s” primary responsibility was to tend to the enormous amount of mail that Twain constantly received, rather than to record his recollections. To bolster his spirits, Twain required continual entertainment. With both daughters absent, Isabel played hostess and saw to his every social desire. Over the period of just one month, October 1908, the following individuals made their way to Stormfield to enjoy Twain’s company and Isabel’s hospitality: Ashcroft; Margaret Blackmer (an Angelfish); Captain Dow of the good ship Caronia and with him his favorite steward, Billy; Wark; Clara; Twain’s sister-in-law Susan Crane; Mrs. Laura Frazer (Twain’s first sweetheart) along with her niece, Ethel Newcombe; Isabel’s mother; a Mr. Phayre; and the cartoonist Thomas Nast. Twain also left Stormfield several times during October: to open the town’s library (named after its most prominent citizen—Mark Twain), and to dine with Leigh Hunt, meet Lord Northcliffe, and visit Colonel Harvey. In all, an impressive 180 visitors came to see Twain during his first year at Stormfield.

  Along with arranging the comings and goings of guests and their entertainments, Isabel had a major workforce issue to resolve. The servants were already dissatisfied with living so far out in the country, and after the September break-in they became convinced their very lives were at risk. On October 1, Claude Beuchotte, the butler, announced that he was leaving and that all the female servants were going to follow him. True to his word, Claude left, and a week later so did the maids and the cook. Isabel spent the remainder of the month hiring a new staff.

  On October 8, Teresa Cherubini and her husband, Giuseppe, agreed to move from New York City to Stormfield and were rehired, and the next day a young local man, Horace Hazen, came to inquire about filling the position of Twain’s butler. While Hazen had never been in service before, Isabel was not in a position to turn down any interested parties and felt that the eighteen-year-old Horace, all six feet one inch of him, just might work out. A few days later Elizabeth Dick, a young woman of seventeen, arrived to assist Teresa upstairs. Elizabeth was very sweet, although quite homesick for her mother. A little over a week after her arrival she told a sympathetic Isabel “that she cannot stay unless she is able to go home nights to sleep with her mother. The quaint wee Soul! I’m letting her go home to her mother’s bed tonight; but also she goes to talk to her mother, & to herself to try to make herself & her mother believe that she will get over her homesickness—Poor wee soul! I … remember my own misery—& the same agony can creep over me even now.” Elizabeth Dick filled out the corps needed, and by October 11, Isabel had hired “2 Italians, & 2 natives, & the washing is to be sent to the laundry in Bethel on trial.”

  Running an estate like Stormfield was no trivial undertaking, and having a staff that was well trained and working satisfactorily together was crucial for Isabel’s peace of mind as well as to her King’s well-being. In order to allay everyone’s concerns about personal safety, an alarm system was installed on October 20. Much to Isabel’s relief, the gong was located just outside her door and the indicator in her bathroom. That night she enjoyed her best sleep in five weeks, “for there has been no night since Sept 18th without a terrified mental shriek in it. It is not fear, it is a pathological condition.”

  Unfortunately, Isabel would enjoy only a momentary respite because Clara, who had come to spend only a few days at Stormfield, decided once again that she should give the servants their instructions—not Isabel. “There is such a confusion over the servants—& the confusion lies not in the servant department, but in a part of the house that gives itself credit for a high line of conduct,” Isabel complained, “I was to go with the King to Irvington yesterday—but I dared not leave this house to a certain derangement, & a possible clearing-out of the present working force. The servants do not want more than one head—hence the wearying wearying confusion.” The two women exchanged ugly words, and, furious, Isabel fled the next day on the “earliest” train.

  5

  Waiting for her at the station in New York was a sympathetic Ralph W. Ashcroft. Ever since Isabel had supported Ashcroft’s accompanying Twain to Oxford, relations between the two had been most cordial. The day before his sailing with Twain, Ashcroft had thanked Isabel by giving her “a great pink rose.” An English native, Ashcroft had been a practical choice as Twain’s escort. Born in Rock Ferry, Cheshire, on March 22, 1875, Ashcroft had made Twain’s acquaintance in 1903, when he was working as the treasurer of the Plasmon Company, in which Twain was a major shareholder. Plasmon was a food supplement, and Twain believed it possessed the power to eradicate starvation, to cure disease, and to make him a tycoon. The company’s headquarters were located in England, and Ashcroft was the secretary of the American branch. With a well-established track record of disaster, Twain was in no position to invest; however, true to form, he could not resist what he thought was a sure-fire investment. Plasmon proved to be no exception to Twain’s unbroken record of investment failure, and all the money he had put in, over $25,000, was eventually lost when Plasmon collapsed at the end of 1909.

  Isabel’s first mention of Ralph Ashcroft came on January 9, 1905, when he visited 21 Fifth Avenue to speak with Twain about business affairs. Ashcroft was thirty years old at the time, slender and good-looking. He came from a quality family, his father having been a Congregational minister, and he had a taste for the finer things in life. Twain quickly grew to like and trust Ashcroft, and admired his overt aggressiveness in business matters. By 1907 Ashcroft had become a regular guest at 21 Fifth Avenue, joining in games of Hearts with Isabel and Twain. Isabel regarded their new “third hand” as “pleasant, bright considerate & properly appreciative.”

  Yet likable as he may have been to his card-playing companions, Ashcroft was not without his detractors. In October 1907, an article in The New York Times described a libel suit between Ashcroft and John Hays Hammond, a wealthy Plasmon investor and mining engineer who had helped found the De Beers diamond company. Ashcroft claimed that Hammond had libeled him by sending a telegram to Twain describing him as “incompetent, or worse.” This legal unpleasantness, however, did not weaken Twain’s confidence in Ashcroft; to the contrary, it had the opposite effect. Twain became convinced that Ashcroft, along with Henry Rogers, would always act on his behalf with the best of intentions.

  By the beginning of 1908 Twain, Isabel, and Ashcroft had become quite a merry trio, much to Paine’s dismay. In mid-January, Ashcroft arrived at Stormfield for an evening of fine dining and playing Hearts with Twain and Isabel. At three o’clock in the morning, after a quart of Scotch had been polished off, the game broke up, according to Isabel, with Twain stumbling, “trying to reach the door & landing up in the corner. … He … cast a gay little eye over at me in his unsteady gait, & said ‘I’m just practicing’—as he sailed with light footsteps over to the door—& up to the bath room—A
shcroft began to spill his cards on the floor, & I picked up a discard of 27 cards & tried to arrange it as my hand.”

  The next day saw a repeat of the previous evening’s antics; however, this time it was Paine’s turn for dinner and billiards. After watching the two men play until eleven o’clock, Isabel retired to bed. She was awakened at half past two in the morning by the sound of billiard balls hitting into one another. Isabel found Twain,

  playing in a drunken haze … & couldn’t move without reeling. It was a great thing to see—P—was furious with me & told me to clear out but I sat down & said I’d stay until the King started for bed. P didn’t like me—but I didn’t care. It was wonderful to see the King pick up a ball & fondle it—& then try to hit it with his cue & be unable to touch it; but he swore splendidly. AB left the room & I gently took … the King’s cue away, & led him to his room. He staggered & hit his head against one of the little angels on his bed post. & grabbed his dear head with a volley of oaths. Then I left the room but waited to hear his shoes drop.

  Taking stock of her situation and the players involved, Isabel decided that her best ally was Ashcroft. Playing Hearts had taught her to carefully plan her next move, and with the addition of Ashcroft to Twain’s circle, she believed that she now had some excellent hands remaining. In January 1908, Isabel and Ashcroft began colluding about restricting Paine’s access to Twain’s letters. When Isabel told Ashcroft how she had managed the Howells letters “episode,” she was pleased to find that “he approved of my method of procedure with Mr. Howells for I wrote him of the fact that the King is quite unaware that Paine sent for the letters. [Crossed out: Ashcroft is so good.]”