Appendix: Sybil and Narcissa’s First Meeting
When I revised the first Sybil Ingram book, Nocturne for a Widow, in 2017, one of the scenes that fell victim to the streamlining process was the one in which Sybil first met Narcissa Holm. For readers who would like some insight into why the two distrust each other so much when they meet again in the present volume, I’m including the scene here. This takes place as Sybil is giving her final performance with Atherton’s troupe before departing for America to marry Alcott Lammle.
I gazed out over the sea of upturned faces in the pit and wondered if I was mad to be giving up this life. Nowhere else would I ever experience this astonishing feeling of having hundreds of people concentrate their attention on me, spellbound, entranced, adoring.
Hundreds of people, yes, but not the entire theater, for when I raised my gaze to the dress circle I encountered an exception. There sat Narcissa Holm, smiling as if congratulating herself that soon she would be in my place.
The gas chandelier illuminated her clearly, and I recognized her from the cabinet cards that were circulating. She was indisputably a beauty, with her black hair, fair complexion, and brilliant blue eyes. Not yet eighteen, she had all the vibrancy of youth. And there was something else: a hard ruthlessness behind her eyes that made me suspect that while she was mouthing the sweetest sentiments of amity behind them lurked a schemer ready to strike if a moment of weakness offered itself.
Perhaps I was the only one to have seen that calculating, predatory air, however, for audiences were hailing her as the most bewitching creature to have trod the boards “since the long-ago début of Miss Sybil Ingram, now well past the hour in which she was hailed a prodigy,” in the words of one of the more obnoxious newspaper reporters. Certainly her actions that night proved me right in finding her dangerous.
She waited until I was taking my curtain call—my crowning moment. The whole audience was on its feet cheering and shouting my name, filling me with the sense of love that nothing but an audience can give. I took bow after bow, and as flowers rained onto the stage and the audience poured out their devotion to me I felt tears on my cheeks and wondered again how I could ever bear to leave this life—and then the little baggage actually strolled onto the stage to join me, brightly illuminated by the spotlight, giving the impression that the crowd’s enthusiasm was for her sake as much as mine.
Why had no one stopped her? When I looked off into the wings I saw Clement Griffiths, my leading man, remonstrating with a well-dressed figure whom I guessed to be Treherne, but the stage manager was nowhere to be found. No doubt he had not imagined he would be needed to oversee my final bows, never imagining that they would be commandeered. I glared at the lad operating the lime follow-spot, and he hastily shifted its brilliant light from the usurper back to me.
The Holm creature bowed to me and offered a bouquet, which I had no choice but to take, with so many eyes watching us. Her smile was triumphant.
“Miss Ingram,” she cooed. “Such an honor. I have admired you all my life!”
A reference to my advanced age: what it lacked in subtlety it made up in accuracy. “I congratulate you, Miss Holm,” I said pleasantly. “Most young persons of my acquaintance do not develop a taste for the theater until they are weaned. But no doubt you are exceptional in that respect as in so many others.”
The contrast between us was marked. I was wearing the coarse shift in which Saint Joan was burnt at the stake, and my hair streamed down around my shoulders in dramatic disarray. My successor, of course, was dressed elegantly for a night at the theater, in a gown of royal blue silk with rose-pink trimming that naturally drew the eye. Gems flashed at her ears and throat—paste, no doubt, but they glittered as if they were genuine.
Her cheeks had taken on a pink tinge at my riposte, but as her eyes flicked over my ensemble she seemed to regain her courage. “How brave of you,” she gushed, “to make yourself so unattractive for a role. It must be simply nerve wracking to go onstage with nothing to fall back on.”
“Nothing besides talent, magnetism, and experience, do you mean? Yes, it must be most distressing to lack those attributes.” Taking her hand, I led her toward the footlights and addressed the audience.
“Ladies and gentlemen!” I began. After so many years of practice at projecting my voice, it took little effort to be heard even over the cheering and applause, and the audience quieted to listen. The orchestra conductor signaled the musicians to cease playing. “You have been so kind to me that I know you can extend that kindness to the young lady here with me. Miss Narcissa Holm will be doing her best to fill my shoes now that I am leaving the stage.” I gave her a reassuring smile. “Dear Miss Holm has confided to me that she is a little—well—nervous at the great responsibility of taking over for me. One can hardly blame her, can one? But I know that you all will reassure our timid flower and be patient with her as she learns her craft... no matter how long it takes her.” She tried to withdraw her hand from mine, but I squeezed it tight. It wouldn’t do to let shyness overcome the dear little thing. “Won’t you show her, ladies and gentlemen, how generous you can be? Do give our newcomer some encouragement!”
Generous they certainly were. As their cheering and clapping rose again, Miss Holm smiled uncertainly and dipped into a curtsey, not knowing whether she was being mocked. I released her hand and withdrew upstage a few paces so that she was for a few moments the center of attention. Then I lifted my bouquet high in farewell and waved expansively.
The sound redoubled, and when Miss Holm turned to peer suspiciously at me, I put my fingertips to my lips and blew her a kiss. “Good luck,” I whispered.
Her eyes narrowed. “I believe you mean—”
“Precisely what I say, my dear.”
Her gaze was poisonous, and I knew I had made an enemy. But an ocean would soon be between us, after all. With a final wave to my last audience, and with Miss Holm’s glare following me, I glided offstage.
To wish anyone in the theater luck, of course, was terribly unlucky. But a little ill fortune would not hurt Narcissa Holm when everything else in her path was lining up to usher her to success.
Acknowledgments
My most ardent thanks go to Lisa Blackwell, Maurice Cobbs, Susan Goggins, Paige Rohe, and Charles R. Rutledge. I am grateful to Diana Plattner and Caitlyn Trautwein for encouraging me to make use of my experience of voicelessness in my fiction. My gratitude also goes to the good people who manage the Friends of Crystal Palace Dinosaurs Facebook page for answering what must have been very perplexing inquiries about the accessibility of the dinosaurs’ insides. Any errors and infelicities are mine alone.
About the Author
Atlanta author Amanda DeWees wrote her doctoral dissertation on 19th-century vampire literature, the perfect training—though she didn’t know it at the time—for writing Victorian gothic romance. Her novels include With This Curse, which won the 2015 Daphne du Maurier Award for historical mystery/suspense. Visit her at amandadewees.com to learn more about her books.
Books by Amanda DeWees
Cursed Once More: The Sequel to With This Curse
Sea of Secrets
With This Curse
Sybil Ingram Victorian Mysteries:
Nocturne for a Widow
The Last Serenade
A Haunting Reprise
“Christmas at Gravesend” (short story)
The Ash Grove Chronicles (YA paranormal romance):
“On Shadowed Wings” (Ash Grove prequel)
The Shadow and the Rose
Casting Shadows
Among the Shadows
Shorter works:
As Strong as Earth (Victorian Vampires #2)
As Vital as Blood (Victorian Vampires #1)
The Heir of Hawksclaw (novella)
“Upon a Ghostly Yule”
Copyright Notice
A Haunting Reprise
Sybil Ingram Victorian Mysteries, Book 3
Copyright © 2018 Amanda DeWees
All rights reserved. Except for brief excerpts in reviews, this book may not be reproduced or distributed in any printed or electronic form without the prior express written permission of the author.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Quotation taken from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem “A Psalm of Life,” 1838.
Cover design by Keri Knutson of Alchemy Book Covers and Design
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