achine
was, he could do vastly greater things with it, make it worth many more
and much larger fortunes by adding this attachment and that, Clemens
was just the man to enter into his dreams and to furnish the money to
realize them. Paige did not require much money at first, and on the
capital already invested he tinkered along with his improvements for
something like four or five years; Hamersley and Clemens meantime
capitalizing the company and getting ready to place the perfected
invention on the market. By the time the Grant episode had ended Clemens
had no reason to believe but that incalculable wealth lay just ahead,
when the newspapers should be apprised of the fact that their types were
no longer to be set by hand. Several contracts had been made with Paige,
and several new attachments had been added to the machine. It seemed to
require only one thing more, the justifier, which would save the labor
of the extra man. Paige could be satisfied with nothing short of that,
even though the extra man's wage was unimportant. He must have his
machine do it all, and meantime five precious years had slipped away.
Clemens, in his memoranda, says:

End of 1885. Paige arrives at my house unheralded. I had seen
little or nothing of him for a year or two. He said:

"What will you complete the machine for?"

"What will it cost?"

"Twenty thousand dollars; certainly not over $30,000."

"What will you give?"

"I'll give you half."

Clemens was "flush" at this time. His reading tour with Cable, the great
sale of Huck Finn, the prospect of the Grant book, were rosy realities.
He said:

"I'll do it, but the limit must be $30,000."

They agreed to allow Hamersley a tenth interest for the money he had
already invested and for legal advice.

Hamersley consented readily enough, and when in February, 1886, the new
contract was drawn they believed themselves heir to the millions of the
Fourth Estate.

By this time F. G. Whitmore had come into Clemens's business affairs,
and he did not altogether approve of the new contract. Among other
things, it required that Clemens should not only complete the machine,
but promote it, capitalize it commercially. Whitmore said:

"Mr. Clemens, that clause can bankrupt you."

Clemens answered: "Never mind that, Whitmore; I've considered that. I
can get a thousand men worth a million apiece to go in with me if I can
get a perfect machine."

He immediately be