October 3 Friday – In York Harbor, Maine Sam wrote to William Dean Howells.
It is a charming book, & perfectly true. It ought to reproach me, for I am making Huck Finn tell things that are perfectly true, this last week or two. They are true, but with that qualification: he exaggerates; you don’t. Still, I have to keep him as he was, & he was an exaggeration from the beginning.
I ran away twice; once at about 13, & once at 17. There is not much satisfaction in it, even as a recollection. It was a couple of disappointments, particularly the first one. The heroics squish out of such things so promptly [MTHL 2: 746]. Note: Howells’ charming book was The Flight of Pony Baker, A Boy’s Town Story (1902). The book dealt with the boy Pony “running off” from his parents. Sam had evidently restarted revisions to “Tom Sawyer’s Conspiracy, his unfinished story he began in 1898 in Vienna.
Sam also replied to Howard E. Wright of the American Plasmon Co., N.Y. (incoming letter not extant). He related Livy’s slow progress and their desire to move her to Riverdale when she was strong enough, a time he could not guess. Yes, he would like Wright to keep him posted on the business, both in New York and London. Sam intended to go to New York for a day when Samuel Bergheim and Henry A. Butters were there to confer with them on Plasmon Co. progress. Sam asked Wright for a favor: look into his challenge to have the Tarrytown house taxes reduced through attorney Henry C. Griffin (Sam had lost Griffin’s address and had not heard from him in three months). He’d just received a tax bill with the same assessment on the property of $80,000; Livy had purchased the house for $45,000. Had Griffin’s efforts been defeated? [MTP]. Note: Henry C. Griffin was the attorney identified by the New York Times, Aug. 20, p.8.
Sam’s notebook: “Send autographed photo to / Fraulein Elizabeth Malaschkin [sic] / Redaction der Zeitung / Riazanski Listok / Riazan, Russia / Done, Oct.3” [NB 45 TS 29]. Note: entry put under Oct. 4.