The Suicide Club

 

by Pa Rock

Reader

Although 19th century Scottish author and poet Robert Louis Stevenson is widely regarded as a children's author with his classics like Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and A Child's Garden of Verse, he was also the author of the more adult-themed novel, Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, as well of a host of short stories which are geared toward adults.

Many years ago I came across an old (1902) copy of a collection of stories by Stevenson entitled The New Arabian Nights, and like the original Arabian Nights, Stevenson's collection included several tales which interlocked with one another.  The first three stories were:  "Story of the Young Man with the Cream Tarts," "Story of the Physician and the Saratoga Trunk," and "The Adventures of the Hansom Cabs" - and those stories were included under the heading "The Suicide Club."

All three tales in in trilogy of stories included the same two main characters, Prince Florizel of Bohemia and his faithful servant, Colonel Geraldine, who held the position of "Master of the Horse" with the Prince.   In addition to being the primary servant to Prince Florizel, Colonel Geraldine was also the Prince's chief confidant and sidekick.  One of their pleasures was to disguise themselves and go seeking adventures among the common folk of London.

One night as they were frequenting a few seedier clubs incognito, the pair encountered a strange young man who entered the club they were in followed by two hired servants carrying trays of cream tarts.  The young man circled through the club offering a free cream tart to each person he encountered. Some accepted his gift, while others wanted no part of whatever game he was playing or one of his tarts.

When he fellow finally got to the disguised Prince and his Master of the Horse, he offered them a cream tart, but before accepting the Prince asked a few questions and learned that the fellow  was giving away as many as he could, but whenever a tart was rejected, the young man would consume that one himself.  As their search for an adventure had been a bust so far, the Prince and Geraldine each took a tart which they ate, and then the Prince proposed that the young man should join them for dinner and further discussion.  The fellow said that he would after he finished with the tarts.   He took his wares to two more clubs, and the Prince and Geraldine followed along to observe his antics.

When the strange business with the cream tarts had ended, the young man threw his empty purse into the street and declared that he spent all of his money on the tarts and had only forty pounds left - for which he had a serious purpose.  After dinner - and dessert - and plenty of conversation, the Prince learned that the fellow had recently fallen in love, but that he could not marry the young woman because he had foolishly squandered the bulk of his intheitance before he met her - and now his intention was to end his life.  But he lacked the courage to kill himself, so he was using his final forty dollars to join a "suicide club" where within a couple of weeks - depending on his luck - a fellow member would dispatch him into the great beyond.

Prince Florizel, recognizing a real adventure when he encountered one, quickly spun a tale for the young man telling him that he and and his friend (Colonel Geraldine) were also facing serious financial difficulties and would like to learn more about the suicide club.  After some discussion, the young man told them to go and get their affairs in order and to meet him at a particular address later in the evening.

An hour or so later the Prince, Colonel Geraldine, and the young man who had been distributing cream tarts, were all sitting in an elegant home smoking cigars, enjoying libations, and preparing to take part in a game of chance which could transform any of them into a corpse or a murderer.

And what followed definitely was not a tale for children!