<p>Robert Louis Stevenson has an important place in the history of the short story in the British Isles: the form had been elaborated and developed in America, France and Russia from the mid-19th century, but it was Stevenson who initiated the British tradition. Stevenson's Calvinist creation and his constant struggle against ill health led to his preoccupation with death and the darker side of human nature as revealed in his work. Despite Steven...