A day or so after the preceding incidents, I made the acquaintance of a Mr Powell, who was a friend of Stevenson’s. I was playing the violin on an American ship that had put into Apia harbour, and he was on board. He was one of the head missionaries, and struck me as a very pleasant gentleman. I was trying to get a berth on the boat, which was going to San Francisco, but I did not succeed. The night before she left I was in the fo’c’sle, playing the fiddle, with the sailors who had accordions and banjos, and as we were playing “Down by the Swanee River” R.L.S. peeped in at the door. I could just see him by the dim oil lamp, as he gazed over the shoulder of Mr Powell, his friend, who was with him. His face lit up with a gleam of pleasure as he listened to the rough sailor concert as one of the crew danced a jig.
Though Stevenson at the time must have been in consumption, he never struck me as delicate, but, on the other hand, looked one of the thin wiry kind, always alert, and boyishly curious in all that was going on around him; when he laughed it was as though to himself over some pleasant memory, and his eyes gazed with a feminine gleam, half revealing the emotional strain of the woman and the firmness of the man in his intellectual face—the mixture that all brave men are made up of. I was unusually observant at that time through my increased knowledge that he was a writer far above the average, and I also noticed the respect with which he was treated by those around him, and especially the natives, who were comical in their unconcealed pride when he spoke to them.
If I had seen and spoken to R.L.S. without knowing who he was, I should have thought he was a skipper or mate of some American or English ship; his manner was easy, in fact, almost rollicking at times.
I met Mrs Stevenson again later, and she asked me to come up to their home and bring the violin, and chided me for not keeping an appointment I had made before. I promised to go, but never went; unfortunately I went off in the morning of the appointed day, on a cruise with my comrade. A hurricane came and blew us out to sea, several times we nearly turned upside down and once a sea went right over the boat, and away went my comrade. I leaned over the side to drag him back, and he grabbed hold of me and over I went also. We could both swim, but I went under, came up and found I was under the boat. It was a terrible feeling of despair and fright that went through me as my head bobbed under the keel; the universe seemed to be a tremendous black grip that had got me into its death-clutch. All the life in my body seemed to wrench my bones apart as I swallowed water and gave a desperate plunge downward in my last bit of consciousness, and came up to the surface just by the boat’s side.
My comrade clutched my head by the hair, and when I was in the boat again safe I almost hugged him with affection, the wind and the flying clouds overhead, all sunlit, made me feel delirious as I thought how near I had been to never seeing them again! At last, after a terrible struggle, we landed some miles round the coast. Our hands were bleeding and blistered through straining at the oars to keep the boat’s head to the seas, and desperate bailing to stop us from being swamped.
As we landed on the beach and pulled our boat safely up the shore, an old native man came running down from the palm patch and offered us shelter, which we gladly accepted. He turned out to be an old servant of some Mataafa chief, full of spite for being out of favour with his late illustrious master, but proud of being a late vassal to Samoan royal blood. He had a nice roomy homestead, two large rooms. Though he was old, his wife looked only twenty. They had one child, a few months old. My chum and I kissed it affectionately and drank bowls of kava which our host kindly gave us. We stayed the night, slept on sleeping mats. All night torrents of rain fell, the hurricane and wind nearly blew the house down and lifted me off my mat, for the room was open three feet from the ground all round in the Samoan style. It was a warm wind; with the moan of the seas breaking on the shore below, the moaning of the bending coco-palms and the wailing cry of the baby at regular intervals, I had no sleep.
Para Rubber-tree
In the morning we went down to the boat; our fishing tackle, revolver and my coat had vanished from the locker. I had my suspicions about our host, and we felt very much annoyed, for we could not go back and accuse him after his hospitality, as we were only absolutely certain in our suspicions, and had no witnesses to prove we had been betrayed—like the astute Fijian maids about whom I told you some pages back. I deeply regretted the incidents of that cruise, which caused my not being able to keep the appointment with Mrs Stevenson.
When I arrived back I went to their home, but they were all away on a cruising trip, I think. I stayed with Holders, my comrade, for some little time after that, long enough to teach him to play simple melodies on the fiddle, and on those nights I composed some of the melodies of my “Entr’actes,” “Song of the Night,” “The Monk’s Dream” and many others which have since been embodied in my compositions for pianoforte, orchestra and military bands.[[5]] I also composed at that time my waltz, “A Soldier’s Dream,” which was played at Government House, Sydney. I received a letter of praise from Sir Henry Parkes and felt very pleased; that waltz became popular all over New South Wales, although it was unpublished, and played from manuscript.