Under the Wide and Starry Sky

  One other bit of good news: The March issue of Scribner’s will contain not only a story by Louis but also my story, “The Nixie.” My third published piece!

  I carry you with me in my heart, Fanny Sitwell. The steadiness of your friendship warms me in this cold place. As I know more, I will keep you apprised. Please give our love to Sidney, and to Henry James, whose champagne saved me.

  Fondly, Fanny

  CHAPTER 55

  The ink was frozen, as it had been every morning since December. Louis grabbed the bottle from his desk and went to the woodstove in the sitting room to warm the black chunk inside. He found his mother bundled up in her buffalo coat and mittens.

  “How are your ears this morning, dear?” Maggie Stevenson asked her son.

  “Did you go through the window again?”

  Maggie Stevenson grinned sheepishly, her face a little white wafer above an enormous fur ruff at her neck. “I’m none the worse for it.”

  Since their arrival in Saranac, his mother had been climbing in and out of her bedroom window and walking around the outside of the house to get to the sitting room, rather than cut through Louis and Fanny’s bedroom, where Louis worked. It was but one of the inconveniences she endured cheerily.

  Fanny had a wood fire going, but the room was frigid. The five of them would stay together there so as to keep warm. Louis would work in the morning, as would Lloyd, who pounded away with gloved fingers at his typewriter. The two men would ice-skate on the pond nearby in the afternoon, or Louis would walk through the snowy hills by himself, carefully avoiding the other tubercular inhabitants, who bore a startling resemblance to those at Davos. Pink-cheeked in the twenty-below weather, they flew by him on horse-drawn sleighs, calling out giddy pleasantries.

  As soon as the ink melted, he would pen a letter of introduction for his new friend McClure, who was headed to London on a foray into the English publishing world, seeking talented writers for his publications. Louis had suggested that Henley act as his agent in London. He would write notes to Henley, Colvin, and Baxter, alerting them that an American newpaper syndicator would be soon knocking on their doors.

  “The neighbors offered to take me into town on the buckboard tomorrow,” Maggie said. “I’ll get groceries and go to the post office.”

  “I can make that trip,” Louis said. “You don’t have to.”

  “No, you work. I rather enjoy the cold air.”

  Louis hardly recognized the delicate matron of 17 Heriot Row. He wondered if a part of his mother had been buried all those years while living with the powerful and protective Thomas Stevenson, for she seemed to have blossomed since his father’s death.

  The words came quickly in the morning, and despite the sounds of boots on wood, the clang of pans, and the repeated fussing at the fireplace as Fanny and Valentine heated up soapstones to put under their feet, Louis lost himself in his novel about the Scottish uprising. He couldn’t seem to get away from that pivotal moment in history when the Scots rose up against the English and were defeated. Louis wanted the book to have sweep, to possess an emotional depth that would satisfy Henry James, and to have a female character who would earn Fanny’s approval. He wanted a tragedy: brother against brother. He wanted no less than the fall of a great house caused by the father’s sin of duplicity.

  “Did you finish your chapter?” Fanny asked later that afternoon. Standing at the stove, dressed in a petticoat with thick wool stockings pulled up to her knees, a heavy pair of boots, and a coat, she was frying a slab of ham in a skillet. Through the window just beyond her, snow fell softly, erasing the rabbit and deer prints that threaded over the white drifts.

  “I did.”

  “Are we to have a reading tonight, then?” Maggie asked, looking up above her reading spectacles at her son. She was seated by the hearth, her feet propped on a fat log to avoid the freezing drafts of air that shot across the floor.

  “I’d prefer to hear a little of Melville,” Louis said. “He has just come among cannibals in the Marquesas Islands.”

  Lloyd lifted his head. He was studying a world map spread out on a table in front of him. “I cast my vote for Typee,” he said.

  After dinner, they gathered around the battered map. Lloyd’s finger traced the route of Melville’s journey in the South Pacific.

  “If we could get a boat in San Francisco, we might sail to the Marquesas,” Lloyd said. “Here is the island of Nuka Hiva where Melville first encountered cannibals.”

  “Are they still eating people there?” Maggie asked cautiously.

  “Cannibales!” Valentine gasped.

  “Former cannibals,” Louis said. “The directory says the missionaries have reformed them.”

  “Oh, think of the warmth,” Fanny said.

  “Palm trees …” Lloyd added.

  “… the air full of the smell of coconut.” Maggie sighed.

  “McClure would pay me in installments for those South Seas letters.”

  They turned in unison toward him.

  “We could afford to do this?” Lloyd asked.

  “If I accept his offer? Quite.” Louis grinned. “What is wealth good for, anyway? Just two things, as I see it—a yacht and a string quartet.”

  “Can you bear another sea journey?” Louis asked her when they were alone in bed. “You’ve hardly recovered from the Ludgate Hill.”

  Fanny was quiet. “We would be out how long?” she said after a while. “A month before we saw land again?”

  “It depends on where we sail to. If we leave from San Francisco, my guess is that it would be three or four weeks before we reach the Marquesas.”

  Her fingers played over her lips. “I could do it,” she said, “I could do it. I want to go see my mother. I could continue on to San Francisco … look into hiring a boat.”

  It would not be easy on her, he knew. But cold air and altitude were not easy on her, either. He was healthiest in places that laid her flat from dizziness or nausea or melancholy. Only in Hyeres had they found a place that worked its spell on both of them.

  Louis glanced at her face. He could tell she was mentally packing her trunk.

  CHAPTER 56

  “Letters from home!” Maggie Stevenson called out when she returned from her errands in Saranac. Louis helped his mother out of her heavy coat and boots. He heaped them in the corner, where they commenced to steam.

  Fanny had a letter from Indianapolis; Louis’s was from Henley in London. The words “Private and Confidential” were printed in the left-hand corner. Odd, he thought. Perhaps Henley was in rough financial straits and did not want Fanny to see a plea for a loan.

  Louis went to his room and sat down on his bed to read the letter.

  March 9, 1888

  Dear Boy … I am out of key today. The spring, sir, is not what it used to be.… I’ve work in hand; I owe not more than a hundred pounds; I am beginning to make a reputation; my verse is printing, and promises well enough; other joys are in store, I believe; and I’d give the whole lot ten times over for—enfin! Life is uncommon like rot … If it weren’t that I am a sort of centre of strength for a number of feebler folk than myself, I think I’d be shut of it damn soon …

  So, he is down in the dumps again, Louis thought. He pictured his friend as he’d seen him many times, with his big, sad face in his hands.

  I read “The Nixie” with considerable amazement. It’s Katharine’s; surely it’s Katharine’s? The situation, the environment, the principal figure—voyons! There are even reminiscences of phrase and imagery, parallel incidents—que sais-je? It is all better focused, no doubt; but I think it has lost as much (at least) as it has gained; and why there wasn’t a double signature is what I’ve not been able to understand …

  I wish you were nearer. Why the devil do you go and bury yourself in that bloody country of dollars and spew? … Lord, you are 4,000 miles from your friends! C’est vraiment trop fort. However, I suppose you must be forgiven, for you have loved me much. Let us go on so till the en
d. You and I and Charles … ‘Twas a blessed hour for all of us, that day thirteen years syne, when old Stephen brought you into my back kitchen, wasn’t it? Enfin—! We have lived, we have loved, we have suffered; and the end is the best of all. Life is uncommon like rot; but it has been uncommon like something else, and that it will be so again … is certain. Forgive this babble, and take care of yourself, and burn this letter.

  Your friend, W.E.H.

  Louis reread the letter and then read it again. It wasn’t the first time Henley had poured out his misery to Louis in desperate agitation. But the paragraph about Fanny’s story was a sudden, vicious punch administered between endearments and self-pitying complaints. Rage blossomed in Louis’s chest when he read the letter a fourth time. It wasn’t his imagination. Henley was accusing Fanny of plagiarism.

  “What is it?” Fanny asked. She had come into the room without his notice and was standing behind him. Louis froze. How could he keep the letter from her? He turned slowly, caught her puzzled look, and knew in that moment it was no use trying to hide it. He handed her the letter and watched her face blanch when she came to the paragraph about her story.

  “But this is ridiculous … it’s a lie! Katharine told me I could use the story line. She said she wasn’t so interested in the thing anymore and that my idea would change its meaning.” She put a hand to her chest, her fingers spread wide. “I don’t understand. You know me, Louis. You know I would never—”

  “Calm yourself, Fanny. I will take care of this.”

  Louis threw on his coat and boots and went out into the snow. He trudged through the fields around the house, playing over in his mind what he could recall of the evening at the Henley’s in London when Katharine told everyone of her story idea. Louis remembered her resistance to Fanny’s suggestions and her refusal to collaborate on the story. But there had been another dinner a year later, at Bournemouth, when Henley admitted he’d had no luck selling the finished piece. Louis couldn’t remember Katharine’s story very well, except that it was a paltry, miserable little thing. Fanny had wheedled her again for a chance at it, and Katharine had been hesitant again. Having known her from childhood, Louis saw the wariness in his cousin’s features, heard it in her voice. Yet she had given verbal permission, albeit reluctantly, for Fanny to take it and adapt it. Fanny’s version wasn’t much better, though Louis didn’t know how close they were in phrase. Louis hadn’t lingered on it. He’d written a cover letter to the editor of Scribner’s and sent in Fanny’s story along with his own assignment for the magazine. And they had bought it. Both pieces had appeared in the March issue.

  Louis inhaled deeply. It was nearly April and bitterly cold; the freezing air stung his lungs. He would have to write to Katharine to insist that she set straight Henley’s memory before the whole thing became a colossal scandal. It occurred to him that he couldn’t do so, for Henley had marked his letter Private and Confidential. How dare Henley insult my wife and then leave me no recourse to appeal to the memories of the others who were present at that dinner!

  Louis walked sullenly back to the house. When he found Fanny in the bedroom, she was heaving the quilt off their bed to shake it. “I’ve never stolen a thing in my life. Never!” She swung the quilt around and knocked over a pile of books on the bedside table. “How dare he accuse me of such a thing?”

  Louis sank down at his desk chair, still wearing the heavy fur coat. “I don’t remember Katharine’s goddamn story.”

  “I changed it. How is this different from what you and all the others have done for years? How is it different from the dozens of ideas I’ve given to you? I offered Katharine a double signature, and she didn’t want it. Don’t you see? This nonsense does not concern my story. It concerns the fact that Henley hates me because I ‘stole’ you away from him. He has always hinted that I am inferior because I am an American. That business about America being the bloody land of dollars and spew? That is an insult aimed directly at me. How would you feel if he said that about Scotland? Admit it! He’s insanely jealous of you. He can’t bear your success. Now he’s gotten wind you’re famous in America, and it’s the final straw.”

  Louis took up his pen and ruined six pieces of paper before he managed to compose a reply to Henley.

  March 22, 1888

  My dear Henley,

  I write with indescribable difficulty; and if not with perfect temper, you are to remember how very rarely a husband is expected to receive such accusations against his wife. I can only direct you to apply to Katharine and ask her to remind you of that part of the business which took place in your presence and which you seem to have forgotten …

  When you have refreshed your mind to the facts, you will, I know, withdraw what you have said to me; but I must go further and remind you, if you have spoken of this to others, a proper explanation and retraction of what you shall have said or implied to any person so addressed, will be necessary.

  From the bottom of my soul, I believe what you wrote to have been merely reckless words written in forgetfulness and with no clear appreciation of their meaning; but it is hard to think that nay one—and least of all, my friend—should have been so careless of dealing agony. To have inflicted more distress than you have done would have been difficult …

  You will pardon me if I can find no form of signature; I pray God such a blank will not be of long endurance.

  Robert Louis Stevenson

  They lay awake through most of that night, talking into the dark.

  “It’s unbearable to think that Katharine and Bob are somehow entangled in this mess,” Louis muttered. “But I can’t see that Henley would have had the nerve to send such an accusation if he hadn’t spoken to them first about their memory of the facts.”

  “Katharine is Bob’s sister. Blood is thicker than water. As for Henley, he’s in love with Katharine. He makes a perfect fool of himself around her. He is making a big show of defending her honor.” Fanny blew her nose furiously and seethed, “I hate them all.”

  She finally slept, but he could not. “Heavyhearted” didn’t begin to describe the elephant pressing down on his chest. It had long been a joke among them that Henley had the tact of a pachyderm. “I reserve the right to insult my friends,” Henley used to say when they confronted him.

  He’d come into Louis’s life when he was in full rebellion against his father. Henley, Bob, and Baxter had become his new family. They swore allegiance to one another a thousand times in taverns, and on deadlines for London, in letters, through serious illnesses and love affairs gone bad. They had hauled each other out of pubs when they were too drunk to get home by themselves, out of debts and blue funks. They had leveled their true opinions at one another’s work and foibles even when it was painful, because they’d sworn their fealty to Truth. What kind of friend would not give another friend the truth?

  That was the card Henley was playing in his letter. As if his friendship superseded Louis’s marriage.

  There had been so much give-and-take over the years between friends; Louis never had kept a scorecard. Henley had worked as Louis’s unpaid agent during the early years when they were all near broke. But Louis had shown his own kindnesses to Henley, giving him money, or loaning it when he got married, contributing stories to London for no pay in order to keep Henley’s magazine alive.

  When he examined it now, he saw other ways he had repaid Henley The plays, for instance. All those hours Louis had spent propping up his old friend by collaborating on plays were hours lost for his own work. He had known it at the time and done it anyway, because he loved Henley despite all his flaws. He would have risked his life for the man. He could not bear the thought of putting his old friend to the door. But this was not the first rift his friend had caused.

  Fanny was right when she said that Henley was jealous of her because she’d “stolen” Louis. “He is a man who wants to run the show. He has lost his power over you,” she’d said, “and he cannot stand it.”

  But it was more than that. Henl
ey carried a deep sense within him about the essential unfairness of life. Though they were sworn brothers, he carried a grudge against his best friend. He could not bear that a man like Louis, born into such comfort, could meet with success as an artist so readily. Henley believed he possessed the same talent as Louis but had been been dealt a far more difficult hand. He bore other scars besides the stump and crutch; he was irrevocably marked by the poverty and loneliness he’d known in childhood.

  Part of his struggle was that he was a poet, and poetry was not as marketable as fiction. He’d had to turn to being an editor. What a bitter pill for him, after all those years of idealizing Art as his life’s purpose. But Henley had made a solid reputation for himself as an editor, and finally, his poetry was being recognized as important. A volume of his work had just been published, for God’s sake. Yet it wasn’t satisfying enough that he was succeeding at last as an artist. It seemed he wanted Louis to suffer.

  By four A.M, Louis despaired of ever sleeping. He got up from the bed and wrote a cordial letter to Katharine, asking her to set straight the facts of the matter. In a letter to Baxter, he poured out the anguish and rage swirling inside him.

  I fear I have come to an end with Henley …

  CHAPTER 57

  Louis waited. He imagined the ten-day voyage of his letters on a steamship. The fastest he would hear from Henley or Katharine would be twenty-some days. Since Henley’s cruel letter arrived, his work had been at a standstill. Louis mostly stayed inside his bedroom, buried under the heavy bedcovers, unsure he could conceal his turmoil in front of his mother and Lloyd. His stomach roiling, his gloved fingers quivering with fury, he wrote one letter after another to Baxter, his only confidant about the matter. How I wish I had died at Hyères, while all was well with me.