“The price is quite reasonable,” he told me. “Besides, it seems like me.”
Whatever my original reservations about the property were, they were only enhanced by the journey we made there one day by train in the early autumn of 1898, just before Stanley was about to purchase it. (“Of course I will buy it only if you approve,” he said.) When we arrived at the Brookwood station from Waterloo, and made our way by hired carriage to Furze Hill, as we entered the grounds, not only did the stony mansion seem more dilapidated and gray than it was in the photographs (it did not help that the weather was grim), the surrounding property seemed covered with an oily greenish scum. At least it seemed to be a quiet sort of place. But then, too, on that day, we heard from the distance the firing of cannons. “What is that?” I asked Stanley.
“Oh, the cannons? Just a bit of a military exercise in progress. You see,” he said rather happily, “the properties surrounding us belong to the British Army: they come out here every several months to drill. The main thing is that we will be absolutely left alone, with few neighbors to disturb us.”
Mother was speechless. Proceeding toward the ruins, she looked at me several times, as she sometimes did, as if to say, “Stanley is mad,” but as much as this suspicion also occasionally entered my mind, I realized that for the first time in years, Stanley seemed happy. Taking us through the house itself (some forty rooms), up half-collapsed stairways and into musty chambers whose ceilings had fallen down—many a room filled with piles of debris as well as the remains of private belongings, including beds, cabinets, and chamber pots—he seemed not at all perturbed. What most enchanted him was the evidence of craftsmanship, which he, with his sharp eye for detail, found everywhere.
Whatever it lacked in aesthetic grace, the mansion must have been a solid enough structure to have lasted so long—like Stanley—and the amount of stonework in the entranceways, the fireplaces, and the friezes seemed fantastic to him. Every room had an elaborate wrought-iron gate in the doorways, and, rusted though they might have been, Stanley delighted in swinging them open. “Can you imagine the man-hours involved?” he asked. Of course Mother was aghast at the thought of anyone except ghosts living there, but I remained tolerant of his interest.
“Can’t you see,” he said to me one day, “that with a little work it could be as fine as any house I have ever seen—as fine and individual a house as what Sam Clemens built in Hartford?”
I did not particularly like that place, but then, to that point, Stanley had never denied me anything I had wanted. And so when he asked me, “What do you think?” even when I found it one of the gloomiest houses I had ever visited, I told him, “It’s wonderful.”
HIRING A CREW of some twenty masons and carpenters, Stanley, like the commander he had once been, presided over the yearlong renovations at Furze Hill, his architect and foreman often by his side. Around its outer walls went up scaffolding, and for five and sometimes six days a week, in the manageable seasons, the sounds of sawing and hammering and winches pulling up old bolts and nails and pieces of flooring could be heard everywhere.
He’d come home on Saturdays (usually by six) and spend an hour soaking in a bath to get the grit out of his skin, thereafter sitting down with Mother and me to dinner and reporting the details of his progress with the house. (I always listened patiently, often eager to head out to some affair in which Stanley had no interest.) Sundays he spent with Denzil, taking him to church in the morning and, in the right kind of weather, strolling with him though the Zoological Society’s gardens at Regent’s Park in the afternoon. (I still have that enviable but disintegrating photograph of Denzil and Stanley in a howdah, riding the massive African elephant Jimbo along a circular dirt track in that park, Denzil cuddling in Stanley’s arms and my husband looking somewhat bemused in the course of participating in London’s famous zoo ride: “I have shot elephants, but never ridden them before,” he said to me that day.) Otherwise, when at home with the child, Stanley attended to his education, reading aloud some Latin texts and teaching him mathematics, as if that boy, at five, were already an adult.
Still, despite his pedantic manner with the boy, Stanley had a soft spot for Denzil and was not immune to the fatherly impulses of spoiling him. Coming in from Furze Hill, sometimes after two weeks’ absence, he’d turn up with some wooden horses or a castle that he had made himself and painted during his evenings alone. But no matter what, he always came home with something for Denzil—a top, a cup-and-balls game, some miniature soldiers—even if he had to prowl the neighborhood around Waterloo station for toy shops. As he’d come into our entranceway, calling out, “Anyone here?” Stanley always looked forward to the moment when our blond cherub, Denzil, would come charging down the hall into his arms, crying out, “Father!”
The cool weather found Stanley at night in the mansion’s front entry hall, where he slept on a cot with some blankets amid the piles of timber and slating and dust, or reading some book by the light of a kerosene lamp, the fireplace blazing. But in good weather, he’d pitch a tent in the field and sleep under the stars (Stanley wrote me many notes about the “glistening, and knowing, character of the constellations”). All this he found invigorating and almost regretted when, after so many months of labor, the tasks at hand were nearing completion.
But transform the place and its grounds he did. Most capriciously, huddling with his architect, Stanley—in fulfilling some boyhood fantasy that had been born of his liking for gothic novels and the strange devices that were found in those fictional houses—had his carpenters install trick sliding walls and cabinets, which, with the press of a button, would open onto a hiding place. Though these installations were costly, Stanley thought them worthwhile, for, as he told me, “If I am bothered by company, I can simply disappear.”
As a final touch, he had a stonemason carve a crest bearing his monogram, HMS, into the entranceway portico; under it was a date, 1899.
OVER THE COURSE of the restoration, Stanley had overseen the transformation of every walkway, every crumbling wall and cracking cornice, into a monument of artisanship. The fences were of the strongest and best description; even the ends of the main gate and fence posts he had dipped in pitch so they would better resist decay. He built footbridges for the many streams that flowed through the grounds; he also constructed a boathouse, which he stocked with canoes for the large pond that Dolly had named Stanleypool. Envisioning Furze Hill as a kind of utopian refuge, Stanley created a sheep farm and brought in bulls and cows to laze about and procreate in a bucolic meadow. While his wife planted rose gardens and put down the seeds of an apple orchard, he made footpaths and set benches and tea tables out so that their future guests might rest after their leisurely strolls. A pine woodland they named the Aruwimi Forest after the dense jungle that the tireless Stanley had once penetrated in Africa as a younger man. A brook that meandered across the property his wife christened the Congo—the naming of such places a happy diversion. (They even gave the surrounding fields African names; there was Wanyamwezi, Mazamboni, and Katunzi, among others, each with its own place in Stanley’s illustrious history of exploration.)
The property itself he called the Bride, in honor of his marriage to Dolly.
AND IN OTHER WAYS 1899 was a good year; for despite Stanley’s decline in relevance to the popular imagination of the British nation, for whom the age of African exploration had become passé, he, having renounced his American citizenship to stand for the House of Commons, could at long last accept a knighthood from the queen. In a ceremony at Windsor Castle, Victoria, stocky and jowl-chinned (she bore a remarkable resemblance to Gertrude Tennant in that regard), wearing a black velvet dress, stood up and, assisted by a royal page, placed around the neck of the kneeling Stanley a golden chain to which was affixed the weighty ornament known as the Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath. In that moment he became Sir Henry Stanley.
“Receiving me at Windsor Castle, the queen actually looked at me with kindness,” he wrote.
&n
bsp; SETTLED IN AT FURZE HILL, Stanley seemed most happy to pursue the life of a country gentleman. Often he rode a horse over the property, or else he just hiked off by himself over the hills, returning home many hours later with some wildflowers gathered from a field for his wife.
He’d come back in a reflective state and, in his reserved manner, retire to his study, where he would sit, at times motionless, before his desk and the quires from his autobiography, the work he had long since lost his desire to write.
And on many a day, in the appropriate seasons, in the hours before he would make his various excursions, Stanley would look from his study window and watch Dolly, in a shepherdess bonnet and florid silk shirtwaist dress, sitting out on their lawn before an easel with a palette of watercolors, executing the most delicate works of nature, renderings that engendered the deepest pride and wonderment. He’d find himself marveling not only at her God-given talents but also at the many pleasures her gentle and vivacious character had brought into his life, even if they had come late. For her presence, and for all the things he had been given—his fame, his wealth, and the adopted son on whom he doted—he often thanked God.
How lonely did Stanley feel when wife and son made their inevitable return to London.
From Lady Stanley’s Journal, circa 1899
IT WAS BY AN AGREEABLE COINCIDENCE that the autumn of 1899 found the Clemens family back in London, having returned from Vienna and other places, and in residence at 30 Wellington Court, Albert Gate, a household that my sister Eveleen and I occasioned to visit, namely in service of Mrs. Clemens’s continuing interest in the psychic realms. However disappointed she had been with the failure of various mediums to summon forth her daughter—“The spirits sometimes sleep for a hundred years before venturing into the world,” I once told her—she seemed to enjoy our lunches and romps to local galleries, where my knowledge of the Pre-Raphaelite painters seemed to interest her greatly, as did any subject that took her mind off her daughter.
In the shadow of her famous spouse, she seemed perpetually humble, but, as I got to know her somewhat, I sensed that under the many layers of her demure personality there resided a tenacious and forthright being, a strong spirit. She was, after all, her husband’s first reader—in effect his editor—and I could sense, knowing Samuel’s mind a bit from his always charming but rambling reflections on his past, that she was invaluable to him, perhaps by way of helping him to organize his thoughts. (Stanley, on the other hand, was loath to show me anything, considering himself a “man’s man” who had no need of assistance.) While she would never say so, I sensed that his books would never have been the same without her.
In the various letters and notes I had received from them in years past, their handwriting seemed identical, though her letters were much more compact: The same note, word for word, that Samuel would need three leaves to write—his handwriting being large—would, in her hand, fill a single page; and so it seemed to me that where he was LARGE she was small. Years of this ratio—which played out, I imagine, in every area of their lives—seemed to account for the way she carried herself.
And yet we got along well enough, despite her lack of interest in social amusements. I wanted to rejuvenate Mrs. Clemens’s female vivacity by taking her to some of the better shops in London to buy new dresses. But however much I tried, she was intent upon her mourning, remaining doggedly in black and wearing her hair, when not under a veil, pulled tight in a bun. A pair of wire-rim spectacles continually reaffirmed the impression she gave of a woman who had not only entered into but also lovingly embraced her premature old age.
NOW, WHILE LIVY WAS MAINLY CONTENT with her life at home, often quietly entertaining visiting family members from America, Samuel had completely embraced London society. Coming out of his gloom over Susy insofar as he could, he not only went out in public willingly but also gave many well-attended talks in every major club, from the Blackfriars to the Savage.
He was sometimes a bit brusque with me, however: I do not know if he was peeved over our spiritualist outings with Livy—though we were only trying to help her out of her grief—or perhaps he was truly overwhelmed with appointments (to the detriment of his writing, as Livy told me), but in those days, during our fleeting encounters, I began to get the distinct impression that he was trying to avoid me. Why I cannot say.
Still, I would often take the liberty of sending him invitations to lunch with Mother and me at Richmond Terrace, with or without Mrs. Clemens, but time and time again came the polite refusal.
Giving this matter further thought, I wondered if he had begun to feel some discomfort in my presence. While this was not the case when Stanley was around (which he often was not, for he mainly liked to stay out in Surrey in those days) or when we headed out with Livy and the girls to a museum or to visit a psychic, or when we were on some other group excursion, but when we were alone, even if we were just speaking in passing, he would seem to become very sad. And sometimes he would look at me with a tenderness that was heartbreaking, as if through his fiercely intelligent mind there raced a variety of dreams that would take his mind off his sorrows. (So I conjectured.)
The last time he posed in my studio, a few years before, I noticed a terrible solitude and longing in him, and though I did not believe that it could have anything to do with me, Samuel, despite his vivacious facade, seemed especially melancholic at our parting. It may have been my fantasy, but I believed that under other circumstances, this kind and moody genius, ageless in his own way, may well have wanted to have a good cry in my arms. It was an impossibility, of course, as we were each inextricably entwined in our own lives, but it occurred to me that he had perhaps come to regard our friendship as something to be carefully managed; along the way I believe that his admiration for my artistic and feminine qualities, which he’d always commented upon favorably, had perhaps blossomed into some kind of autumnal infatuation, which neither of us had any use for.
One evening, however, when I shared these thoughts with Mother, she tried to set my mind straight on the subject.
“My dear daughter, yours is a remarkable vanity to think that a man like Mr. Clemens would have any interest whatsoever in your person beyond a mild and socially amicable friendship, which exists because of Stanley. If Samuel is sad it is because he is getting old, which is never easy on anyone, and because he has an ailing wife and has lost his most beloved daughter. What man wouldn’t ache in such circumstances? Mr. Clemens, however famous he might be, is no exception.” Then: “But my God, what a dreamer you are.”
ODDLY ENOUGH, A FEW DAYS LATER, Mother informed me that she had invited Mr. and Mrs. Clemens to lunch and that they had accepted. On a Saturday in late November, they arrived with their daughter Jean. At the outset, Clemens had been most apologetic for his long absence from our household and seemed disappointed that “Sir Henry,” as he liked to call him since his knighthood, had not been able to make it in from Furze Hill. Indeed, Stanley had planned to come home for the occasion, but, as often happened in those days, he had been in no condition to travel, even over such a short distance. (The journey took about two hours, including carriage rides to and from the stations.) Aside from regretting Stanley’s absence, Clemens seemed to be in good spirits. And as it seemed that the Clemenses’ sojourn in England would likely end soon, perhaps by summer, for they were longing to return home, I insisted that they promise to visit us at Furze Hill in the spring, for by then the winter’s frost would have passed and, God willing, Stanley would be better.
“Well,” said Mr. Clemens. “Stanley has written to me about the place; it sounds as if he is building a little kingdom there; so perhaps we will.”
FURZE HILL, EASTER WEEKEND, 1900
From Lady Stanley’s Journal, the Evening of April 14, 1900
OVER DINNER THIS EVENING, Samuel told a humorous story about his family’s stay at Dr. Kellgren’s spa, in Sweden, where they had gone the year before in search of an osteopathic cure for various ailments. It was an awful place th
at he likened to a “Nordic hell” because of its primitive facilities and terrible food. “But it does make you forget your infirmities,” he said drily. He also held forth about his latest investment in some kind of new carpet-weaving machine and his continued interest in a food supplement called Plasmon, a nutrient derived from curdled skim milk, which he saw as a means to eliminate the scourges of famine in places like Africa.
Stanley listened attentively. Having tried Plasmon himself, thanks to Samuel, Stanley had noted some mild improvement with his own Africa-born gastric difficulties (I believe he was just being kind, as this “wonder powder” had not really made much difference), and then, intrigued by the notion, he questioned Samuel as to the practical matter of the organization and distribution of such a product. “How would such a wonder food be distributed in the countries where it is most needed, such as Africa?” he asked. “And what would prevent the unscrupulous from profiting? It seems that for every good soul there are three to undo his best intentions.”
“Well, I am taking this one step at a time,” Samuel gloomily answered.
(Privately Stanley thought that Clemens’s altruistic views about saving mankind from itself were half-baked; by his lights, any solution to the world’s problems would only spring forth from a universal moral order—sadly, based on his experience in the Congo, I don’t think he really believed such an order was possible.)
Twain & Stanley Enter Paradise Page 38
