“Bored? A horse?”
“Terribly so. You see,” Stevenson explained as he returned to the saddle, “Jack was a circus horse in his prime. The circus came to Samoa but Jack didn’t sail well, so the performers sold him before they folded up their tent and left the island. Sometimes he does his tightrope trick or his dancing for old time’s sake.” He patted the horse warmly. “You’re safe,” he cooed to the animal. “He is really quite converted, and is as steady as a doctor’s cob. When he has to be fast, he is the fastest animal you have ever seen.” The novelist began to hum a melody so silly I guessed it had to be a tune he had heard at Jack’s old circus.
I was still hearing the ridiculous tune and seeing the horrible heads hours later at Vailima when we were seated at dinner. Belial said grace. I could not pay much attention to it nor to Fanny, though her discussion of a new plan for her garden—where she would put tomato seeds, and artichoke, and eggplant—was a welcome distraction.
“You were born to be in the garden, Barkis,” Stevenson said.
Her hand froze before her cup reached her lips. “What do you mean to say, Louis?” she asked with a sidelong glance.
“Just that. You have the soul of a peasant,” he said cheerfully, “not because you love working in the earth, but because you like to know it is your own earth that you are delving in.”
“But you are not of a peasant soul. Only me. Is it so?”
The rest of the room, even the native servants, watched with dread as Stevenson sipped his ’ava and considered how to answer.
“Now, now, mother,” Lloyd tried to interject with his meandering, lackadaisical calm, “what is it we’re talking about here?”
“I am an artist,” Stevenson answered his wife bluntly.
“It is a lovely garden, if I may interject,” I tried, but I don’t think anyone heard.
“Louis—” Lloyd tried again.
“Well, I suppose if I had the soul of an artist, instead of that of a peasant, the stupidity of possessions would have no power over me. You may be more right than you know.”
“Barkis, my dear fellow, you misunderstand,” he offered, a little late. “You know I think you are the most beautiful woman in the world.”
Before any of us had more than a few bites of the first course of stewed beef and potatoes, the tension was broken by the sound of screaming.
“Can we not even sup in peace around here?” Belle said with a petulant toss of her fork. “If it is not arguing over some patches of brown grass, it’s another loony islander to interrupt us.”
“Quiet, Belle. That’s Charlie,” Fanny said.
The noises were coming from the stables. Davenport, unnerved from what we had already witnessed today, appeared ashen and turned whiter as the melancholy sounds continued. We all got up and walked in a line to the stables to investigate.
“Poor, poor Charlie,” Stevenson said, leading us inside.
Inside the paddock the servant was bound to a makeshift bed at his ankles and wrists. He had become horribly gaunt and continued to perspire heavily even as Fanny rotated wet rags on his head and body. Two doctors, covered in more tattoos than the warriors, looked him over, chanting heathen songs, sprinkling some herbs into his mouth and ears, rubbing and kneading pungent arrowroot pulp into his skin. Belial placed himself next to them, delivering an urgent prayer. A few of the other servants were sitting nearby, heeding all of Fanny’s instructions. Belle clutched her hands to her heart.
“I’m afraid we’ll have no choice now but to keep Charlie restrained,” Fanny said, her voice breaking. “We have had the best native doctor here three times to administer the herbs and other stronger medicines from the bush, but since the day he began acting like a lunatic Charlie’s fever has not broken and he remains delirious. He is a danger to himself and to the others.”
“I fear you will think we are a sort of imitation Wuthering Heights with all this drama.”
“Not at all, Tusitala,” Davenport assured him. “I only hope the boy recovers—and soon.”
“I will not let a young man die in Vailima under my care,” Fanny said, with tears in her eyes but with a robust voice. “Not in Vailima.”
The noises that came from Charlie could be described only as yelps. Belle appeared faint at the dire condition of the man. She stumbled back and Davenport steadied her.
“Thank you,” she whispered, folding herself into his arm.
“Your mother is right, Miss Strong. He will recover,” Davenport said with the conviction of a promise.
That night, the conch sounded a mournful cry. Charlie had died, consumed by fever. His funeral out on the grounds was presided over by Belial. Even his big voice was nearly drowned out by the sobbing of the mourners from Vailima. Stevenson was bedridden for hours the next day, Fanny inconsolable. For all I felt over the loss of a young man with so much life in him, I was taken by the depth of sorrow in Davenport, a man who usually swallowed his emotions. He could hardly speak—this time not as a result of a stubborn or petulant mood, but because he was moved. Or so I thought. When he secluded himself in our dismal hut among the spiders and roaches and the howling wind beating at the shutters, I had a new thought. I began to suspect I had missed something.
“Davenport, I insist you tell me what’s really happened.”
“Damned fools,” he said, banging his fist violently on one of the beams that supported our walls. He was sitting on the floor and his head was hanging low.
“You believe it was Belial,” I said. “That’s it, isn’t it? That he caused this somehow? I do not know why I did not see it before. But no. No. I accept your great rivalry with him, but consider it with a clearer head. Would he do that to Charlie? Just to ingratiate himself further into the Stevensons’ household by ministering to him, then by comforting them after he died? No, I do not believe it.”