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the communication open while I wrote my biography of Reid. I meant to
wind up with this latter great work, and then dismiss the subject for
good.
Well, ever since then I have worked day and night making notes and
collecting and classifying material. I've got collectors at work in
England. I went to New York and sat three hours taking evidence while
a stenographer set it down. As my labors grew, so also grew my
fascination. Malice and malignity faded out of me--or maybe I drove them
out of me, knowing that a malignant book would hurt nobody but the fool
who wrote it. I got thoroughly in love with this work; for I saw that
I was going to write a book which the very devils and angels themselves
would delight to read, and which would draw disapproval from nobody
but the hero of it, (and Mrs. Clemens, who was bitter against the whole
thing.) One part of my plan was so delicious that I had to try my hand
on it right away, just for the luxury of it. I set about it, and sure
enough it panned out to admiration. I wrote that chapter most carefully,
and I couldn't find a fault with it. (It was not for the biography--no,
it belonged to an immediate and deadlier project.)
Well, five days ago, this thought came into my mind (from Mrs.
Clemens's): "Wouldn't it be well to make sure that the attacks have been
'almost daily'?--and to also make sure that their number and character
will justify me in doing what I am proposing to do?"
I at once set a man to work in New York to seek out and copy every
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