Pulitzer_ A Life in Politics, Print, and Power - James McGrath Morris [198]
Pulitzer told his staff to send no cables for a month, unless they were “supremely important.” In Kensington he leased a different manor from the last one, and was sorely disappointed. “The barracks next door are just about as bad as they could possibly be, bugles at night, in the morning at six, there are four clocks or chimes, and peacocks in the neighborhood, all conspiring to spoil my much-needed repose.”
In Britain, Pulitzer tested out several new secretarial candidates. The search for suitable companions remained an unsolvable problem for his aides. Pulitzer was impossible to please. Guests found being with him hard enough—they had to put up with his strictures against slurping soup or crunching on toast—but those who worked directly for him endured intolerable demands. One candidate, who quit after two weeks, told Pulitzer that one result of his having spent so many years bossing people was that he no longer knew how to relate to others. “You have therefore become so used to command that any other position with regard to those always with you became impossible to you.
“You must forgive me a further observation. Like all very successful men you have a degree of contempt for those whose lives have been to some extent failures,” continued the very frank candidate. “You cannot help letting them feel that you regard them, through being in the necessity of taking such a position, an inferiority in life.”
Pulitzer headed back to the United States without the hoped-for addition to his private staff. With the World past its crisis, he was eager to indulge his passion for presidential elections. Before sailing, Pulitzer told the British press that Bryan was likely to be the Democratic nominee in 1900 and hinted that the World might support his candidacy this time around. “That all depends upon his good sense or folly,” said Pulitzer. If Bryan was willing to drop his support of free silver, he would have a united party behind him, Pulitzer predicted. If he refused, he would lose.
That summer Pulitzer reopened Chatwold, which had been unoccupied for more than a year and a half. His return to his hideaway in Maine was marred by his dissatisfaction with the remodeling of the “tower of silence.” When he inspected his study he found that it was still not soundproof, and the lighting proved inadequate. The builder wanted $108,000, 250 percent more than the initial estimate. Pulitzer refused to pay the bill.
His house in New York also created unexpected expenses. The city’s fire marshal warned Pulitzer that unless he made some alterations, the house’s current condition might prove disastrous. He reminded Pulitzer that two fires had already occurred because of defective flues. Pulitzer, who had survived the deadly fire at the Southern Hotel in St. Louis, was not one to argue. He fixed the flues, constructed an enclosed fire escape in the rear of the building, repaired the electric lights, and installed a fire alarm in his valet’s room.
Kate joined Joseph in Maine only briefly, preferring instead to divide her time between New York and Hot Springs, Virginia. Joseph’s intolerant behavior had not abated since his grief-filled stay on Jekyll Island, and her patience with him was at a low point. It didn’t help, either, that Joseph had instructed his cashier to cut $160 from her $6,000 monthly allowance, for customs duty he had paid on her behalf. Angus Shaw, the World’s cashier, who was used to being in the financial crossfire between the couple, warned her, “I suppose you will understand it, but I thought it best to let you know in case of any misunderstanding.”
The relationship was getting back to normal.
Chapter Twenty-Five