The Bottle Imp.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume IX, Issue 25, 18 June 1892, Page 614

The Bottle Imp.

BY

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

Note.- Any Studeiit of t hat very unliterary product, the English drama of the early part of the century, will here recognise the name and the root idea of a piece once rendered popular by the redoubtable it. Smith. The root idea is there and identical, and yet 1 believe 1 have made it a new thing. And the fact that the tale has been designed and written for a Polynesian audience may lend it some extraneous interest nearer home.—R.L.S.

— HERE was a man of the island of Hawaii, : whom I shall call Keawe, for the truth is he T I ■ lives. and his name must be kept 'X I Becre *' > hut the place of his birth was not far from Honaunau, where the bones of Keawe the Great lie hidden in a cave. This man was poor, brave, and active. He could read and write like a schoolmaster. He was a first-rate mariner besides, sailed for some time in the island steamers, and steered a whaleboat on the Hainakau coast. At length it came in Keawe’s mind to have a sight of the great world and foreign cities, and he shipped on a vessel bound to San Erancisco. This is a fine town, with a fine harbour and rich people uncountable, and, in particular, there is one hill which is covered with palaces. Vpon this hill Keaw e was one day taking a walk, with his pocket full of money, viewing the g-eat houses upon either hand with pleasure. ‘What fine l ouses these are !’ he was thinking, ‘ and how happy must tl ese people be who dwell in them and take no care for the morrow !’ The thought was in his mind when he came abieait of a house that was smaller than some others, but all finished and beautified like a toy. The steps of that house shone like silver, and the borders of the garden bloomed like garlands, and the windows were blight like diamonds, and Keawe stopped and wondered at the excellence of all he saw. So stopping, he was aware of a man that looked forth upon him through a window—so clear that Keawe could see him as you see a fish in a pool upon the reef. The man was elderly, with a bald head and a black beard ; and his face was heavy with sorrow, and he bitterly sighed. And the truth of it is that as Keawe looked in upon the man, and the man looked out upon Keawe, each envied the other. All of a sudden the man smiled and nodded, and beckoned

Keawe to enter, and met him at the door of the house. • This is a fine heuse of mine,’ said the man, and bitterly sighed. ‘ Would you care to view the chambers’’ So he led Keawe all over it, from the cellar to the roof, and there was nothing there that was not perfect of its kind, and Keawe was astonished. ‘ Truly,’ said Keawe, ‘ this is a beautiful house ; if I lived in the like of it, I should be laughing all day long. How comes it, then, that you should be sighing?’ ‘ There is no reason,’ said the man, ‘ why you should not have a house in all points similar to this, and finer, if you wish. You have some money, I suppose ?’ ‘ I have fifty dollars,’ said Keawe ; * but a house like this will cost more than fifty dollars.’ The man made a computation. •I am sorry you have no more,’ said he, ‘ for it may raise you trouble in the future ; but it shall be yours at fifty dollars.’ • The house ?’ asked Keawe. • No, not the house,’ replied the man, ‘ but the bottle. Eor, I must tell you, although I appear to you so rich and fortunate, all my fortune and this house and its garden came out of a bottle not much bigger than a pint. This is it.’ And he opened a lockfast place and took out a roundbellied bottle with a long neck ; the glass of it was white like milk, with changing rainbow colours in the grain. Withinsides something obscurely moved, like a shadow and a fire.

* This is the bottle,’ said the man ; and, when Keawe laughed, ‘ You do not believe me ?’ he added. * Try, then, for yourself. See if you can break it ?’ So Keawe took the Lottie up and dashed it on the floor till he was weary ; but it jumped on the floor like a child’s ball, and was not injured. ‘ This is a strange thing,’ said Keawe. ‘ For by the touch of it, as well as by the look, the bottle should be of glass.’

‘ Of glass it is,’ replied the man, sighing more heavily than ever ; ‘ but the glass of it was tempered in the flames of hell. An imp lives in it, and that is the shadow we behold there moving, or so I suppose. If any man buy this bottle the imp is at his command ; all that he desires—love, fame, money, houses like this house, ay, or a city like this city-all are his at the word uttered. Napoleon had this

bottle, and by it he grew to be the king of the world ; but he sold it at the last, and fell. Captain Cook had this bottle, and by it he found bis way to so many islands ; but he, too, sold it, and was slain upon Hawaii. For, once it is sold, the power goes and the protection ; and unless a man remain content with what he has, ill will befall him.’ * And yet you talk of selling it yourself ?’ Keawe said. * I have all I wish, and I am growing elderly,’ replied the man. ‘ There is one thing the imp cannot do —he cannot prolong life ; and, it would not be fair to conceal from you, there is a drawback to the bottle ; for if a man die before he sells it, be must burn in hell forever.’ ‘To be sure, that is a drawback and no mistake,’ ciied Keawe. ‘ I would not meddle with the thing. I can do without a house, thank God ; but there is one thing I could not be doing with one particle, and that is to be damned.’ ‘ Dear me, you must not run away with things,’ returned the man. ‘ All you have to do is to use the power of the imp in moderation, and then sell it to someone else, as I do to you, and finish your life in comfort.’ * Well, I observe two things,’ said Keawe. ‘ All the time you keep sighing like a maid in love, that is one ; and, for the other, you sell this bottle very cheap.’ ‘ I have told you already why I sigh,’ said the man. •It is because I fear my health is breaking up ; and, as you said yourself, to die and go to the devil is a pity for anyone. As for why I sell so cheap, I must explain to you there is a peculiarity about the bottle. Long ago, when the devil brought it first upon earth, it was extremely expensive, and was sold first of all to Prester John for many millions of dollars ; but it cannot be sold at all, unless sold at a loss. If you sell it for as much as you paid for it, back it comes to you again like a homing pigeon. It follows that the price has kept falling in these centuries, and the bottle is now remarkably cheap. I bought it myself from one of my great neighbours on this hill, and the price I paid was only ninety dollars. I could sell it for as high as eighty-nine dollars and ninety nine cents, but not a penny dearer, or back the thing must come to me. Now, about this there are two bothers. First, when you offer a bottle so singular for eighty odd dollars, people suppose you to be jesting. And second —but there is no hurry about that, and I need not go into it. Only remember, it must be coined money that you sell it for.’ ‘ How am 1 to know that this is all true ?’ asked Keawe.

‘Some of it you can try at once,’ replied the man,’ ‘ Give me your fifty dollars, take the bottle, and wish your fifty dollars back into your pocket. If that does not happen I pledge you my honour I will cry off the bargain and restore your money.’ ‘ You are not deceiving me ?’ said Keawe.

The man bound himself with a great oath. ‘ Well, I will risk that much,’ said Keawe, ‘ for that can do no harm.’ And he paid over his money to the man, and the man handed him the bottle.

‘ Imp of the bottle,’ said Keawe, ‘ I want my fifty dollars back.’ And, sure enough, he had scarce said the word before his pocket was as heavy as ever. ‘ To be sure this is a wonderful bottle,’ said Keawe.

* And now good morning to you, my fine fellow, and the devil go with you for me !’ said the man. * Hold on,’ said Keawe, * I don’t want any more of this fun. Here, take your bottle back.’ * You have bought it for less than I paid for it,’ replied the man, rubbing his hand*. *lt is yours now ; and, for my part, lam only concerned to see the back of you.’ And with that he rang for his Chinese servant and had Keawe shown out of the house.

Now, when Keawe was in the street, with the bott’e under his arm, be began to think. *lf all is true about this bottle, I may have made a losing bargain,’ thinks he. • But, perhaps, the man was only fooling me.’ The first thing he did was to count his money ; the sum was exact —forty-nine dollars American money and one Chili piece. • That looks like the truth,’ said Keawe. • Now I will try another pait.’ The streets in the part of that city were as clean as a ship’s decks, and though it was noon, there were no passengers. Keawe set the bottle in the gutter and walked away. Twice he looked back, and there was the milky, round-bellied bottle where he left it. A third time he looked back, and turned a corner ; "but he had scarce done so, when something knocked upon his elbow, and behold ! it was the long neck sticking up ; and, as for the round belly, it was jammed into the pocket of his pilot coat. • And that looks like the truth,’ said Keawe.

The next thing he did was to buy a coikscrew in a shop, and go apart into a secret place in the fields. And there he tried to draw the eork, but as often as he put the screw in, out it came again, and the cork as whole as ever.

‘ This is some new sort of cork,’ said Keawe, and all at once he began to shake and sweat, for he was afraid of that bottle.

On bis way back to the port side he saw a shop where a man sold shells and clubs from the wild islands, old heathen deities, old coined money, pictures from China and Japan, and all manner of things that sailors bring in their sea chests. And here he had an idea. So he went in and offered the bottle for a hundred dollars. The man of the shop laughed at him at the first, and offered him five ; but, indeed, it was a curb us bottle, such glass was never blown in any human glassworks, so prettily the colours shone under the milky white, and so strangely the shadow hovered in the midst ; so, after he had disputed awhile after the manner of his kind, the shopman gave Keawe sixty silver dollars for the thing, and set it on a shelf in the midst of his window.

• Now,’ said Keawe, ‘ I have sold that for sixty which I bought for fifty—or, to say truth, a little less, because one of my dollars was from Chili. Now I shall know the truth upon another po'nt ’ So he went back on board his ship, and, when he opened his chest, there was the bottle, which had ccme more qirckly than himself. Now, Keawe had a mate on board whose name was Lopaka. ‘ What ails you ?’ said Lop ka, ‘ that you stare in your chest?’ They were alone in the ship’s forecastle, and Keawe bound him to secrecy, and told him al'.

* This is a veiy strange affair,’ said Lopaka ; ‘ and I fear you will be in trouble about this bottle. But there is one point very clear —that you are sure of the trouble, and you had better have the profit in the bargain. Make up your mind what you wi nt with it ; give the order, and if it is done as you desire I will buy the bottle myself ; for I have an idea of my own to get a schooner and go trading through the islands.’ ‘ That is not my idea,’ said Keawe ; ‘ but to have a beautiful house and garden on the Kona Coast, where I was

born, the sun shining in at the door, flowers in the garden, glass in the windows, pictures on the wall, and toys and fine carpets on the tables, for all the world like the house I was in this day—only a storey higher, and with balconies all about like the King's palace ; and to live there without care and make merry with my friends and relatives.' ‘Well,’ said Lop aka, ‘let us csrry it back with ns to Hawaii ; and if it all comes true, as you suppose, I will buy the bottle, as I said, and ask a schooner.’ I’poo that they were agreed, and it was not long before the ship returned to Honolulu, carrying Keawe and Lopaka, ami the bottle. They were scarce come ashore when they

met a friend upon the beach, who began at once to condole with Keawe.

‘ I do not know what I am to be condoled about,’ said Keawe.’

‘ Is it possible you have not heard,’ said the friend, ‘ your unc ] e _that good old man—is dead, and your cousin—that beautiful boy—was drowned at sea?’ Keawe was filled with sorrow, and, beginning to weep and to lament, he forgot about the bottle. But Lopaka was thinking to himself, and presently, when Keawe’s grief was a little abated, ‘ I have been thinking,’ said Lopaka, ‘ had not your uncle lands in Hawaii and in the district of Kau ’’ ‘ No,’ said Keawe, ‘ not in Kau ; they are on the mountain side—a little beyond South Hookena.’ ‘ These lands will now be yours ?’ asked Lopaka. ‘ And so they will,’ says Keawe, and began again to lament for his relatives. ‘ No,’ said Lopaka, ‘do not lament at present. I have a thought in my mind. How if this should be the doing of the bottle ? For here is the place ready for your house.’ ‘ If this be so,’ cried Keawe, ‘ it is a very ill way to serve me by killing my relatives. But it may be, indeed ; for it was in just such a station that I saw the house with my mind's eye.’ ‘ The house, however, is not yet built,’ said Lopaka. ‘ No, nor like to be I’ said Keawe : ‘ for though my uncle has some coffee and ava and bananas, it will not be more than will keep me in comfort ; and the rest of that land is the black lava.’ ‘ Let us go to the lawyer,' said Lopaka ; ‘ I have still this idea in my mind.’ Now, when they came in to the lawyer’s, it appeared Keawe’s uncle had grown monstrous rich in the last days, and there wa-> a fund of money. ‘ And here is the money for the house !’ cried Lopaka. ‘lf you are thinking of a new house,'said the lawyer, ‘ here is the card of a new architect, of whom they tell me great things.’ ‘ Better and better !’ cried Lopaka. ‘ Here is all made plain for us. Let us continue to obey orders.’ So they went to the architect, and he had drawings of houses on his table. ‘ You want something out of the way,’ said the aichitect. ‘ How do you like this ?’ and he handed a drawing to Keawe.

Now, when Keawe set eyes on the drawing he ciied out aloud, for it was the picture of his thought exactly drawn. ‘I am in for this house,’ thought he. ‘ Little as I like the way it comes to me. I am in for it now, and I may as well take the good along with the evil.’

So he told the architect all that he wished, and how he would have that house furnished, and about the pictures on the wall, and the knick knacks on the tables ; and he asked the man plainly for how much he would undertake the w hole airair.

The architect put many questions, and took his pen and made a computation ; and when he had done he named the very sum that Keawe had inherited. Lopaka and Keawe looked at one another and nodded. * It is quite clear,’ thought Keawe, ‘ that lam to have this house, whether or no. It comes from the devil, and I fear I will get little good by that; and of one thing I am sure, I will make no more wishes as long as I have this bottle. But with the house I am saddled, and I may as well take the good along with the evil. •» So he made his terms with the architect, and they signed a paper ; and Keawe ami Lopaka took ship again and sailed to Australia, for it was concluded between them they should not interfere at all, but leave the architect and the bottle imp to build and to adorn that house at their own pleasure. The voyage was a good voyage, only all the time Keawe was holding in his breath, for he had sworn he would utter no more wishes, and take no more favours from the devil. The time was up when they got back. The architect told them that the house was ready, and Keawe and Lopaka took a passage tn the Hall, and went down Kona way to view the house, and see if it had been done fitly according to the thought that was in Keawe's mind. Now, the house stood on the mountain side, visible to ships. Above, the forest ran up into the clouds of rain ; below, the black lava fell in dill's, where the kings of old lay buried. A garden bloomed about that house with every hue of flowers ; and there was an orchard of papaia on the one hand and an orchard of herdprint on the other, and right in front, toward the sea, a ship’s mast had been rigged up and bore a flag. As for the house, it was three storeys high, with great chambers and broad balconies on each. The window s w ere of glass, so excellent that it was as clear as water and as bright as day. All manner of furniture adorned the chambers. Pictures hung upon the wall in golden frames-pictures of ships, and men ‘ighting, and of the most beautiful women, and of singular places ; nowhere in the world ate there pictures of so bright a colour as those Keawe fottnd hanging it; his house. As for the knick-knacks, they were extraordinarily fine ; chiming clocks and musical boxes, little men with nodding heads, books filled with pictures, weapons of price four all quarters of the wot hl, ami the most elegant puzzles to entertain the leisure of a solitary man. And as no one would care to live it; such chambers, only to walk through ami view them, the balconies were made so broad that a whole town might have lived upon them in delight, ami Keawe knew not which to prefer, whether the back porch, where you get the land breeze, and look upon the orchards and the flowers, or the front balcony, where you cottld drink the wind of the sea, and look down the steep wall of the mountain, and see the Hall going by once a week or so, between Hookena and the hills if I’ele, or the schooners plying up the coast for wood and ava ami bananas. When they viewed all, Keawe ami Lopaka sat on the porch. ‘ Well,’ asked Lopaka, ‘ is it all as you designed ’’ ‘ Words cannot utter it,’ said Keawe. ‘lt is better than I dreamed, and I am sick with satisfaction.’

‘There is but one thing to consider,’said Lopaka, * ail this may be quite natural, and the bottle imp have nothing whatever to say to it. If I were to buy the bottle, and got no schooner after all, I should have put my hand in the tire for nothing. I gave you my word, I know ; but yet I think you would not grudge me one more proof.’ ‘ I have sworn I would take no more favours,’ said Keawe. ‘ I have gone already deep enough.’ ‘This is no favour I am thinking of,’ replied Lopaka. •It is only to see the imp himself. I'here is nothing to be gained by that, and so nothing to be ashamed of, ami yet if I once saw him I should be sure of the whole matter. So indulge me so far, and let me see the imp ; and, after that, here is the money in my hand, and I will buy it.’ ‘ There is only one thing I am afiaid of,’ said Keawe. ‘The imp may be very ugly to view ; ami if you once set eyes upon him you may be very nndesirous of the bottle.' ‘lam a man of my word,’ said Lopaka. ‘ Anti here is the money betwixt us.’ ‘ Very well,’ replied Keawe, ‘ I have a curiosity myself. So come, let us have one look at you, Mr Imp.’ Now, as soon as this was said, the imp looked out of the bottle, and in again, swift as a lizard ; and there sat Keawe and Lopaka turned to stone. The night had quite come before either found a thought to say or voice to say it with, ami then Lopaka pushed the money over ami took the bottle.

‘ I am a man of my wot I,’ said he, ‘ ami had need to be so, or I would not touch this bottle with my foot. Well, I shall get my schooner and a dollar or two for my pocket, and then I will be rid of this devil as fast as I can. Eor, to tell you the plain truth, the look of him has cast me down.’ • Lopaka,’ said Keawe, •do not you think any worse of me than you can help. I know it is night, ami the roads bad, and the pass by the tombs an ill place to go by so late, but I declare since 1 have seen that little face I cannot eat or sleep or pray till it is gone from me. I will give you a lantern and a basket to put the bottle in, and any picture or line thing in all my house that takes your fancy, and be gone at once, and go sleep at Ilookena with Naliinu.’

* Keawe,' said Lopaka, * many a man would take this ill ; above all when I am doing you a turn so friendly as to keep my word and buy the bottle ; and for that matter, the night and the dark, and the way by the tombs must be all tenfold more dangerous to a man with such a sin upon his conscience and such a bottle under his arm. But, for my part, 1 am so extremely terrified myself, I have not the heart to blame you. Here Igo then ; and I pray God you may be happy in your house, and I fortunate with my schooner, and both get to Heaven in the end in spite of the devil and his bottle.’

So Lopaka went down the mountain ; and Keawe stood in his front balcony and listened to the clink of the horse’s shoes, and watched the lantern go shining down the path, and along the cliff of caves where the old dead are buried ; and all the time he trembled and clasped his hands, and prayed for his friend, and gave glory to God that he himself was escaped out of that trouble. But the next day came very brightly, and that new house of his was so delightful to behold that he forgot his tenors. One day followed another, and Keawe dwelt there in perpetual joy. He had his place on the back porch ;it was there he ate and lived, and read the stories in the Honolulu newspapers ; but when anyone came by they would go in and view the chambers and the pictures. And the fame of the house went far and wide ; it was called Ka Huie Hui—the Great House —in all Kona; and sometimes the Blight House, for Keawe kept a Chinaman, who was all day dusting and furbishing ; and the glass, and the gilt, and the fine stuff's, and the pictures, shone as bright as the morning. As for Keawe himself, he could not walk in the chambers without singing, his heart was so enlarged ; and when ships sailed by upon the sea, he would fly his colours on the mast.

So time went by, until one day Keawe went upon a visit as far as Kailau to certain of his friends. There he was well feasted, and left as soon as he could the next morning, and rode hard, for he was impatient to behold his beautiful

house ; and, besides, the night then coming on was the night in which the dead of old days go abroad in the sides of Kona ; and, having already ni ddled with the devil, he was the more chary of meeting with the dead. A little beyond Ilonaunau, looking far ahead, he was aware of a woman bathing in the edge of the sea, and she seemed a well-grown girl, but he thought no more of it. Then he saw her white shift flutter as she put it on, and then her red holoku, and by the time he came abreast of her she was done with her toilet, and had come up from the sea and stood by the track side in her red holoku, and she was all freshened with the bath, and her eyes shone and were kind. Now Keawe no sooner beheld her than he drew rein. ‘ I thought I knew everyone in this country,’ said he. * How comes it that 1 do not know you,?’ ‘ I am Kokua, daughter of Kiano,’ said the girl, ‘and I have just returned from Oahu. Who are you ?’ ‘ 1 will tell you who I am in a little,’ said Keawe, dismounting from his horse, ‘but not now. For I have thought in my mind, and if you knew who I was, you might have heard of me, and would not give me a true answer. Hut tell me, first of all, one thing: Are you married?’ At this Kokua laughed out aloud. ‘lt is you who ask questions,’ she said. ‘ Are you married yourself ?’ ( ‘ Indeed, Kokua, I am not,’ replied Keawe, 1 ‘ and never thought to be until this hour. But > here is the plain ci uth. I have met you here at \ the roadside, and I saw your eyes, which are like I the stars, and my heart went to you as swift as a bird. And so now, it you want none of me, say so, and I will go on to my own place ; but, if you think me no worse than any other young man, say so, too, and I will turn aside to your father's for the night and to-morrow I will talk with the good man.’ Kokua said never a word, but she looked at the sea and laughed. ‘ Kokua,’ said Keawe, ‘ if you say nothing I will take that for the good answer ; so let us be stepping to your father’s door.’ She went on ahead of him still without speech, only sometimes she glanced back and glanced away again, and she kept the strings of her hat in her mouth. Now, when they had come to the door, Kiano came out on his verandah and cried out and welcomed Keawe by name. At that the girl looked over, for the fame of the great house had come to her ears : and, to be sure, it was a great temptation. All that evening they were very merry together ; and the girl was as bold as brass under the eyes of her parents, and made a mark of Keawe, for she had a quick wit. The next day he had a word with Kiano, and found the girl alone. ‘ Kokua,' said he, ‘ you made a mark of me all the evening, and it is still time to bid me go. I would not tell you who I was, because I have so line a house, and I feared you would think too much of that house and too little of the man that loves you. Now you know all, and if you wish to have seen the last of me, say so at once.’ ‘ No,’ said Kokua, but this time she did not laugh, nor <li<l Keawe ask for more.

(TO BE CONCLIIIHIIJ Paris is not exactly the place where one would go for a miracle play, but it has seen a curious revival of the sacred drama. Not only has M. Grandmogin’s * Christ ’ attracted extraordinary attention at the Theatre Moderne, but a few months ago another author—M. Joseph Fabre—brought a play on the same subject to Sarcey, the famous critic. * There is only one man in Paris who could put upon the stage the figure of Christ,’said Saicey, ‘and that man is Mounet Sully ; go to him and say that I sent you.’ And M. Fabre went to him to be received with the words, ‘ Jesus Christ 1 I was thinking about it; I have even a play on the subject in my mind.’