The Unluckiest Man in the World by Bernard Capes
Carabas, a small, capable hotel servant at Verey’s in Montreux, is famed for unfailing good humour and extraordinary ill-luck. After selling a lottery ticket shortly before it wins thirty thousand francs, he loses a consolation fund when the bank holding it fails. Though accomplished, courageous, multilingual, and endlessly helpful, he accepts poor wages and regards his own welfare as unimportant. He calls himself a cosmopolitan and “a foundling of Fortune,” but reacts strangely when England is mentioned. While ill from eating a bad oyster to please Ninette, a pretty kitchen girl, Carabas is absent during a family scandal involving the narrator’s fiancée, Campaspe, and her brother Miller. Miller, infatuated with the showy and suspect Mademoiselle Celestine, refuses to abandon her despite his family’s efforts. Their father is called away, leaving the narrator charged with protecting the family’s interests and Campaspe from the disgrace caused by Miller’s attachment. After recovering, Carabas silently intervenes. One evening, when the narrator and Campaspe unexpectedly meet Miller and Celestine returning from the lake, Carabas confronts Celestine. He tells a story of a notorious Parisian courtesan and gambler whose Corsican husband, enraged by her conduct, has pursued her after she fled in disguise. Though the story is largely invented, Carabas has recognized Celestine from published pictures and guesses correctly that it will terrify her. She panics and flees, abandoning Miller. Shocked by what he believes he has discovered, Miller resolves to return to England and his father. The following morning Miller leaves without notice, leaving the narrator and Campaspe exposed to gossip. The narrator must go to Paris and entrusts Campaspe to a companion. Soon he receives word from Mr. G— that Carabas requires an operation for appendicitis: the cherry-stone he swallowed while confronting Celestine has caused the danger. The hotel management resists paying, but Mr. G— undertakes the expense in gratitude for Carabas’s service. Carabas’s life remains uncertain for days, while the narrator, Mr. G—, and Campaspe nurse him. Believing himself near death, Carabas begins to confide the chief incidents of his life to Campaspe.
By Bernard Capes · First published 1904 · Genre: Short Story, Literary Fiction, Comedy of Manners · 3,160 words
First lines
He was nicknamed, ironically, Carabas-a sort of French equivalent for Fortunatus-the only title by which I ever knew him. Perhaps the underlying sympathy which impelled the jest reconciled him to its mockery; for there is, after all, an acute distinction in being the unluckiest man in the world. Somebody says somewhere that it is better to "lead" in hell than be a super in heaven. There came a time, I think, when Carabas would have resented good fortune as an outrage. It would have broken his record, and made him commonplace at a blow. As with Hawthorne's young woman who was bred and throve on poisons, a normal dietary would have been fatal to him. Carabas was nurtured on ill-luck.
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Genres
- Short Story — The work is a compact, self-contained prose narrative focused on a limited cast, a single hotel setting, and a sequence of connected incidents culminating in the revelation of Carabas's past.
- Literary Fiction — Its principal interest lies in character, irony, moral ambiguity, cultivated narration, and the contrast between Carabas's apparently comic misfortune and his concealed dignity.
- Comedy of Manners — The story satirizes hotel society, social reputation, romantic folly, class assumptions, gossip, and the performative behavior of its cosmopolitan guests.
- Romantic Drama — A central plot concerns the narrator's engagement to Campaspe and the effort to save her impressionable brother from an exploitative and scandalous liaison.
Tags
Edwardian fiction · short story · Swiss Riviera · Montreux · Belle Époque Europe · grand hotel · hotel servant · cosmopolitan identity · ill luck · fatalism · self-sacrifice · loyalty
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The Unluckiest Man in the World is listed on Textopian as a short story by Bernard Capes, dated 1904 CE.
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- Work type: Short story
- Author: Bernard Capes
- Date: 1904 CE
- Language: English
- Genres: Short Story, Literary Fiction, Comedy of Manners, Romantic Drama, Psychological Fiction
- Length: 3,160 words
- Structure: 1 section, 53 paragraphs
- Reading fit: Standard (8th-9th Grade)
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