Three weeks later Clemens wrote to Twichell:
Livy is coming along: eats well, sleeps some, is mostly very gay, not
very often depressed; spends all day on the porch, sleeps there a part of
the night; makes excursions in carriage & in wheel-chair; &, in the
matter of superintending everything & everybody, has resumed business at
the old stand.
During three peaceful months she spent most of her days reclining on the
wide veranda, surrounded by those dearest to her, and looking out on the
dreamlike landscape--the long, grassy slope, the drowsy city, and the
distant hills--getting strength for the far journey by sea. Clemens did
some writing, occupying the old octagonal study--shut in now and
overgrown with vines--where during the thirty years since it was built so
many of his stories had been written. 'A Dog's Tale'--that pathetic
anti-vivisection story--appears to have been the last manuscript ever
completed in the spot consecrated by Huck and Tom, and by Tom Canty the
Pauper and the little wandering Prince.
It was October 5th when they left Elmira. Two days earlier Clemens had
written in his note-book:
Today I placed flowers on Susy's grave--for the last time probably
--& read words:
"Good-night, dear heart, good-night."
They did not return to Riverdale, but went to the Hotel Grosvenor for the
intervening weeks. They had engaged passage for Italy on the Princess
Irene, which would sail on the 24th.
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