Under the Wide and Starry Sky

CHAPTER 66

1890

Cold germs found Louis easily enough in Sydney. Soon he was coughing, and then, for the first time since he fell ill in Tahiti, he was hemorrhaging.

They had ended their cruise on the Equator dreaming of a return to Europe, if only for a visit. Now even that diminished plan was crushed.

“You will die if you go back to Britain,” a Sydney doctor told Louis. “You cannot return for any length of time. It’s as simple as that.”

The news staggered Fanny. She watched Louis struggle bravely to put a good face on it. “There are only a few people in England and one or two in America whom I will truly, truly miss.” After a day or two, though, he could not conceal his despair. “I heard a church bell this morning,” he told her,  “and I  was back  in  Swanston,  in  my  grandfather’s country church.” His eyes looked o? beyond her, as if he were seeing, just behind her, the old parishioners he once knew. “It was so vivid! I wanted to be there.” He shook his head with sober resignation.  “I am going to die in exile. When I return to Scotland, it will be to a grated cell in the Calton Burial Ground.”

As his fever rose, Fanny saw what had to be done. She went down to the docks, looking for a boat that might take them out to sea while they waited for the cottage to be ?nished. A maritime strike was under way, and boats were not leaving Sydney. Only one, a copra trading ship called the Janet Nicoll, had a nonunion crew and intended to sail despite the strike. When Fanny inquired about taking passage, she drew a ?at no from the shipping company owner, Mr. Henderson, who communicated to her through a representative.
“I didn’t get a chance to explain myself properly,” Fanny told Louis when she returned from the harbor.

“Oh, I think the owner got your message clear enough. He doesn’t want us, my dear. The man has his hands full just getting his ship out of port.”

“I’m going back tomorrow,” she said,  “and I’m going to get us on that boat. You can stake your wig on it.”

The  following  afternoon,  Fanny  waited  outside  Henderson’s  o?ce  for  an  interview. When he opened his door, he wore a scowl. “Madam,” he said, “this is a working boat with fifty men. There is no place to put a woman.”

“I sailed as the only woman on the Equator, sir,” Fanny said. “I have lived the same way the men live. You would not have to make any special accommodations for me. And I can afford the fare, whatever that might be.”

The man shot her a baleful look that asked, Why my ship?

“My husband is extremely ill. We have found that he regains his health when he is at sea. Yours is the only ship that will be leaving this harbor, and the sooner my husband gets sea air in his lungs, the better.”

The owner nearly gu?awed. “All the more reason why I cannot take you on, madam. The last thing I am equipped to handle is a sick man.” With that, his head withdrew, and he shut the door.

Progress, she thought. The man spoke with a Scottish accent. Was there a living Scot who did not feel pride in the accomplishments of a countryman, particularly one as beloved as Louis?

The  next  day,  she  stopped at  a  bookstore  before  going  again  to  the  Henderson  and McFarlane  shipping  company.  When  she  went  in  search  of  Henderson,  his  assistant informed her he would not see her.

“Tell him I won’t bother him after today.”

Some thirty minutes later, Henderson’s harried face peered around the half-opened door. Fanny reached into her satchel and held out to him copies of Treasure Island and Jekyll and Hyde. The man looked blankly at them.

“Do you know these books?”

“Mmm,” he grunted.

“My husband, Robert Louis Stevenson, wrote them. You are Scottish, yes?” “Yes.”

“Then you know that Mr. Stevenson is a national treasure to your people. To have my husband perish here because he could not get out to sea would be an incredible loss to his countrymen. You could have a hand in saving his life.”

The man chewed his tobacco furiously.

“I will not hold you responsible if he dies at sea,” she said, her voice quavering. “This is his only chance. Do you understand?”

“Wait here,” he said, taking the books she pressed into his hands.

She paced outside his door. When he returned, he planted himself in the doorway with

his arms crossed. “This ship sails with sealed orders. Do you know what that means?”
“No.”

“It means you will not be told where we intend to sail. I shall be on the ship, and I can assure you, you will have no say in where we go. We will be out for four months, and during that time, you will receive not a particle of special attention. If you get o? the boat at one of our stops and are not on board when we depart, we will not look for you. We will leave you. Do you understand?”

“I do.” She turned to go but stopped in her tracks. “I forgot to mention. There are three of us, not two. My son is traveling with us.” She hurried out the door and didn’t look back.
Fanny  raced  around  Sydney  buying  gifts.  She  remembered  the  women  she  had  met already,  both  native  women  and  the  wives  of  missionaries  and  traders.  She  hadn’t encountered one yet who wasn’t starving to have a pretty new garment or decoration. She ended up buying printed fabrics and a box full of arti?cial ?owers to make wreaths. In a dry goods store, she came across a notebook labeled Lett’s Australasian Diary and Almanac, 1890. She needed a proper journal. She bought the Lett’s and wrote her name on the cover. Below it, she wrote in block letters, The Cruise of the Janet Nicoll.

On this voyage, she intended to keep good notes. Memory was a ?ckle thing, and Louis counted on the details she pulled out of her journals. But it was more than that. Already they had been at sea for nearly two years. This would be the third and last ship voyage before they settled into the house in Samoa. It was a piece of her life she did not want to lose.

The following morning, she wrapped Louis in blankets and walked behind as four strong sailors carried him aboard on  a  gurney.  It might have been  a  funeral procession,  with Fanny carrying armfuls of arti?cial ?owers. At one point, a drunk young white man with a rose in  his lapel rushed up  in  an  attempt to assist the sailors, but lost his footing  and pitched backward o? the gangplank into the water, where he ?ailed around until someone rescued him.

Fanny opened the porthole in their cabin so Louis could gulp the sea air as the ship departed. An exile he might be, but at least he was alive.