A Newly Found R.L. Stevenson Story Published

A newly published, long-lost short story by Robert Louis Stevenson is a whimsical tale of an English gentleman, way down on his luck, who marries a wealthy young woman and must obey her every order.

The story, “The Enchantress,” is published for the first time in the fall edition of Georgia Review, the literary magazine of the University of Georgia. David Mann, a professor at Miami University of Ohio, found the manuscript among uncatalogued papers at Yale University.

The 27-page manuscript was handwritten in pencil, apparently in 1889 while Stevenson was on the schooner Equator from Hawaii to Samoa, where he spent the last years of his life after leaving Scotland because of his failing health. He died in Samoa in 1894.

It was sold for the first time in 1914 and changed hands among collectors until it was bought at auction in 1923 and dropped from sight.

In the first-person story, the hero, a Mr. Hatfield, is lounging outside a French casino, broke from gambling and wondering where he’ll find his next meal.

He considers several options and decides on panhandling. His first--and last--target is the lovely Miss Croft, a wealthy orphan under the nominal control of a guardian who is himself something of a gambler, and not a very good one.

In cumbersome Victorian English, Hatfield puts the bite on Miss Croft, who identifies him as a gentleman. She gives him 1,000 francs--a bundle in those days--turns up the charm and makes a proposition.

They are to meet as if by accident in Paris, take the same train to Calais and the same boat back to England.

Sometime later, after several stipulations, they are married in a simple ceremony in Scotland.

After the ceremony she says goodby on a street corner, reminding him of his promise to obey and tells him to return to his hotel room.

Two days later a letter from her lawyer arrives saying it would be better if he never saw Miss Croft again and that she had left the country.

It turns out that Miss Croft had just turned 21, but could not get control of her inheritance from the guardian until she married.