Somerset Maugham Short Stories Rain And 13 Others

The first of the stories in this collection, Rain, was written in 1920 in Hong Kong, but I had hit upon the idea for it during a journey I took in the South Seas during the winter of 1916. The last of my stories was written in New York in 1945 from a brief note that I found by chance among my papers and which I made as far back as 1901.

"Rain" On the way to Apia in the Pacific, a ship stops at Pago Pago; the passengers include Davidson, who is a missionary, and his wife. Because of an epidemic of measles (a serious disease for local people) on the island, the ship cannot leave until it is sure none of the crew is infected. The Davidsons find lodgings with a trader on the front. For most of their stay there is heavy rain. Also staying there from the ship is Miss Thompson, and from her room is heard the sound of a gramophone and men's voices; they remember she came on board at Honolulu and is presumably from Iwelei, the red-light district there. Davidson is determined to stop her activities, and to make her change her ways is often with Miss Thompson, whom he now familiarly calls Sadie. Her personality changes and she becomes repentant, it appears. A few days later it is found that Davidson has committed suicide, and that Sadie Thompson has scornfully changed back to her former self.

"The Fall of Edward Barnard" In Chicago, Bateman Hunter and Edward Barnard both love Isabel Longstaffe, a cultured, intelligent girl. She gets engaged to Edward. After his father's financial ruin and suicide, Edward enters the business of a Chicago merchant with an agency in Tahiti; he will come back to Isabel in a year or two. There is a change in the tone of Edward's letters to Isabel, so Bateman, still friends of them both, visits Tahiti during a business trip. He finds that Edward, sacked from the merchant's business, is working in a trader's store, and is the adopted nephew of Arnold Jackson, known in Chicago as a notorious fraudster who spent seven years in the penitentiary. Edward is happy, saying "I never knew I had a soul until I found it here". He intends to marry Jackson's half-caste daughter. When Isabel learns all this from Bateman, she removes her engagement ring, and happily accepts his proposal of marriage. Bateman looks forward to a successful business career in Chicago.

"Honolulu" The narrator is shown round Honolulu by his host, and is introduced to Captain Butler, an American, who tells his story: Trading with his schooner, he visits a native of a Pacific island and, becoming interested in his daughter, offers to pay him for her, which he accepts, and she accompanies Butler on his travels in the schooner. The ship's mate, a native known as Bananas, becomes sullen and it emerges that he has taken a fancy to the girl. Butler, not wanting to fire a good sailor, hits Bananas to end the matter, but afterwards becomes increasingly ill. An American doctor finds nothing wrong, but a native doctor thinks an enemy is praying him to death; he will die before the full moon unless Bananas dies first. The girl brings about Bananas' death, after which Butler recovers: "She knew that if he could be brought to look into a calabash in which was water so that a reflection of him was made, and the reflection were broken by hurtling the water, he would die as though he had been struck by lightning; for the reflection was his soul."

"Mackintosh" Walker is the administrator of Talua, one of the Samoan Islands. He is corpulent, coarse, and treats the local people like children or with contempt; Mackintosh, his assistant, who is intellectual and methodical, has grown to hate him. Walker hires local people to build a road for £20; their leader Manuma, who has lived in Upolu and knows what the job is worth, holds out for £100. Walker gets workers from another village to come and do the work, and by Polynesian rules of hospitality the local people must look after them; finally Walker tells them to pay the visitors for building the road. Manuma, who faces ruin, implores Mackintosh to help; he notices a gun on the desk, and Mackintosh, whose hatred of Walker is reaching breaking point, "felt as though something possessed him so that he acted under the compulsion of a foreign will"; he goes out of the office, leaving Manuma with the opportunity to take the gun.

"Appearance and Reality" In Paris, Monsieur Le Sueur, a Senator and businessman, attends a fashion show with his wife, and sees Lissette Larion, a model; he establishes her as his mistress, providing her with an apartment. Later when Le Sueur has become a Minister, he discovers Lissette has a boyfriend. He agrees to her marrying the boyfriend, since it is appropriate for a Minister's mistress to be a respectable married woman.

"The Happy Couple" At Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat (Maugham's home in later years), the narrator attends a dinner party given by a neighbour, who has invited Mr and Mrs Craig, a couple who live next door to her. The narrator brings his acquaintance Sir Edward Landon, an English judge. The Craigs are terrified of Landon, and leave the area the next day. He later tells the narrator that the Craigs appeared before him years ago accused of murder; he was sure they were guilty and expected to sentence them to hang, but the jury found them not guilty.