When at last her strength seemed equal to the long journey, she once more turned her face towards the setting sun, and beautiful California. On the way a flying stop was made in Indiana to see relatives and friends of her girlhood. Speaking of them she says, "I saw my old friends, the Fletchers. They came to see me in droves, and it was strange to see them old men and women, talking of their grandchildren. It seems so difficult to realize that one's self is old; indeed, I don't believe I ever shall." While in Indianapolis she met for the first time her distinguished compatriot, James Whitcomb Riley, who afterwards wrote to her recalling the occasion of their meeting in his own gentle, kindly way. I quote the letter:
"Since your brief visit here last winter I've been remembering you and your kindness every day, and in fancy have written down--hundreds of times--my thanks to you and yours--once, when first well enough to get down-town, wrapping a photograph for you of the very well man I _used_ to be. Finding the portrait this Christmas morning, I someway think it good-omenish, and so send you the long-belated thing, together with a copy of a recent book in which are most affectionally set some old and some new lines of tribute to the dear man who is just away. How I loved him through his lovely art! And how I loved all he loved and yet loves--for with both heart and soul, and tears and smiles, he seems very near at hand. Therefore my very gentlest greetings on this blessed day go out to him as to you.
[Footnote 68: Quoted by courtesy of Mr. Edmund Eitel, nephew of Mr. Riley.]
Mrs. Stevenson wished to live within sight of the Pacific Ocean, so she purchased a lot at the corner of Hyde and Lombard Streets, on the very top of one of San Francisco's famous hills, and at once began the building of her house, living meanwhile for a time on Belvedere Island and later at 2751 Broadway. The creation of a new thing--whether it might be a dress, a surprise dish for the table, a garden or a house, always appealed strongly to her, and as she plunged eagerly into the business of planning and discussing with architects and contractors, her interest in life rose again. As she remarked, "It is awfully exciting to build a house." Mr. Willis Polk was the architect, but he followed her design, which she made by building a little house out of match-boxes on the corner of a table. The house was rather unusual in its plan, flat-roofed, and with architecture somewhat "on the Mexican order," as the contractor said. It fitted in well with the landscape and gave one a feeling of home comfort and cheer within. She herself said it was "like a fort on a cliff." Hidden from the street by a high retaining wall and a colonnade embowered in vines was a beautiful garden where she gradually collected rare plants from various parts of the world. A wide stretch of emerald lawn filled the centre, and around its borders were massed flowering shrubs and small trees--low-growing varieties purposely chosen in order not to hide the sea view from the windows. Here a climbing syringa brought from the romantic Borda gardens in Mexico, where the sad Empress Carlota used to walk, flung out its tendrils gaily to the salt sea breeze, and seemed never to miss the kindlier sun of its former home. At one side there was a small cemented pool, the birds' drinking-place, where many of the little creatures came to dip their bills and trill their morning songs. In this quiet scented garden, kept safe from intruding eyes on all sides by vine-covered walls and shrubbery, one might sit and dream, reminded of the outside world only by the clanging of a street-car bell or the distant whistle of an ocean steamer.