There we stood, in 1922 in deepest Peru, tied to posts. Stanley, my wife, and I. The natives were cheerfully piling firewood at our feet.
"Not very stealthy of you, Stanley. Playing a violin in the middle of the jungle," I said.
"The hunters, they thought it was maybe a wounded animal," said my wife Loka.
Loka was a native herself. At first she had railed against the Europeans, but with experience she had had the revelation that although we were all individually idiots, together, we would inevitably steamroll the world. So she figured, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em. She had learned our sciences. She'd become a naturalist. She was determined to return to her homeland and teach the Europeans to value it before they blindly destroyed it. I'd met her on a previous expedition, and she'd agreed to marry me. This expedition we were cataloguing nuts and fruits together. This was hundreds of miles from her origin, but she was still our guide and interpreter. Stanley and I were experienced explorers, but next to her, we looked like a couple of Boy Scouts.
Some natives were gathered around the violin. They would chatter among themselves, then one would pluck a string, puck, they'd shirk back, then launch into more chatter, waving their hands and arguing with one another.
"Be careful with that!" shouted Stanley.
"Stanley, you are an idiot," mumbled Loka.
"Well it was my grandfather's! He marched into battle in the civil war playing it."
"Stanley. My friend. What do you call someone who marches into a battle, where people are shooting each other, and stands in the open playing a violin?"
"Well, OK, I admit it doesn't make much sense when you say it that way."
There was a general hush. An old woman came forward and started a fire in some kindling at the base of our poles. A trio of old men stood, with flutes, and started playing something high pitched and melodic.
"I guess this is it," I said.
"Your work has done us good," Loka told me. "Be proud."
The fire caught on a little more. I listened to the flutes. "Is that in D minor?"
I fished for the harmonica in my pocket, was able to put it to my mouth, and tried to play along. One of the flute players stopped, but motioned the others to continue. It WAS in D minor. I managed to do simple chords in accompaniment.
Natives were talking to each other, motioning. I tried imitating the full melody. All the flute players stopped. Loka garbled something to them. They acted startled and put out the fire. They untied us, and motioned for me to play more. I did. "What do you Do with a Drunken Sailor," "Irish Washerwoman", then "Road to Lisdoonvarna." Then Mozart, "Eine Kleine Nachtmusik." Then the Danube Waltz. Natives started dancing.
Loka had been negotiating. "I've got them to agree to let us go, if you give them the harmonica and violin and promise not to come back."
"But ..." we said.
"Please, this is not the time to be idiots. You can buy more. Your people are good at making things."
I handed over my harmonica to the old man, the chief flute player. He peered at it carefully. The natives discussed. Then the old man thrust the harmonica over his head and there was silence. He held it with one hand straight up, looking down, feet apart. He slowly brought the harmonica down to his mouth. And played. In-out breathy chords. Total amateur.
"And now we leave. Slowly." said Loka.
We walked away. I heard the old man experimenting, improving rapidly. Sounded like he'd stumbled on how to bend a note. Started trying something like Blues.
"OK, and now we run," said Loka.
The old man was doing things I wouldn't have thought were even possible on a harmonica. I slowed, then turned around and stared, slack-jawed.
Loka grabbed my face, had me stare into her eyes, and told me we had to go. I shook myself out of it and followed her.
If it weren't for that harmonica in my pocket, we would have been goners.
This was first posted on reddit.com r/WritingPrompts, in response to my own prompt, "if it weren't for the harmonica in my pocket I would have been a goner." The prompt was prompted by an anecdote of an explorer escaping because the natives were fond of Mozart on the harmonica. I can't find a reference. This is a natural place to include the joke of violas being better than violins because they burn longer, but I didn't see how to fit it in. Yes my gggg-grandfather was shot in the hand while carrying a violin into a civil war battle, but he was holding up the Yankee flag at the time, not playing the violin.