The Captain's Lady - a Zebra illustrated gothic

It's been over a year since I read my first Zebra Illustrated Gothic (Summerhaven), so I figured it was about time I give another one of these a try.  As anyone who reads this blog knows, I've been reading the Zebra Mystery Puzzlers for some time now, and these Zebra Illustrated Gothic novels were published around the same time (the end of the 1970s), and based upon the illustrations in each series, it would appear Kensington Publishing Corp. used the same artists for both the mysteries and the Gothics. It's funny, because I've been reading so many of the Zebra Mystery Puzzlers, in which the illustrations have clues to "whodunnit" in the mystery, I found myself inspecting each of the illustrations in this book, wondering if there were any clues as to the mystery within Elswick Manor (and, of course, there were not!).

 

The Captain's Lady was written by Rachel Edwards, which was a pseudonym for Brenda Castle (who also wrote under the name "Georgina Ferrand").  Castle was quite the prolific author of romance novels between 1973 and 2010, and she managed to sneak in a few Gothics, such as this one, along the way.  The story opens much like the start of Dark Shadows - in fact, it felt almost as if I were reading a version of the show when the author has the main character, Elinora Vernon, reflecting that she was "going to a place she did not know, to people had not seen" (pp. 6-8) in order to be a governess for a young child.  Gee, sound familiar?  That is nearly a mirror image of the opening scene to the first episode of Dark Shadows - except, instead of Victoria Winters riding on a train bound for Collinsport, Maine, we have Elinora riding in a stagecoach on her way to the small England town of Elswick.  Both young woman move into a dark foreboding mansion that overlooks the ocean, with waves crashing down on the rocks below.  The author here even makes reference to a "Collingford Inn" (p. 6) that certainly sounds a lot like "Collinsport Inn" from Dark Shadows!  Now, there are no vampires, werewolves, or witches in this story, but there is certainly the threat of a ghost called "The White Lady" that haunts the great manor.

 

Edwards a/k/a Castle provides readers with a haunting tale of passion and horror as Elinora is pursued by two very different men, all while trying to protect the young child she is tutoring.  The question is, from whom is she protecting Prudence? Is it from the girl's guardian, Captain Gideon Lang, a former seaman who is said to have once loved Prudence's mother before she married another man?  Did he really kill the girl's father and is now after her inheritance, as Prudence believes?  And what about Reid Sterling, the rather all-too-forward man of the world who has somehow wormed his way into the Manor as a guest of the Captain?  Are his advances towards Elinora sincere, or are his intentions less than pure? What hold does he have over the lord of the manor?  Then there is Elsie, the housekeeper's daughter.  Elinora cannot help but notice the relationship between her and the Captain is much too friendly for a lord and his servant.  Is there a more personal relationship between the two?  And one cannot overlook the west wing of the great house, which has been closed off ever since Captain Lang purchase the manor some ten years ago.  Why does Elinora keep seeing lights from that part of the house, and whose face is she seeing in the upstairs window?  Everyone tells here there is no one there, but Elinora knows what she saw.  What dark secret is being kept within those darkened halls...?

 

Oh, and we cannot forget the White Lady, the ghost that the villagers say haunts Elswick Manor.  Elinora is just one in a long list of governesses who have come and gone, and despite warnings from the villagers, Elinora is determined to stay.  After all, she does not believe in ghosts.  But young Prudence is insistent the White Lady is real, and that the ghost is determined to kill her!  The longer she stays in the house, the more Elinora begins to realize there is something dangerous going on within its walls.  Danger lurks around every corner - is it really the ghost of Prudence's mother come back to exact revenge; or is the culprit very much alive and hoping to steal a fortune by taking the girl's life and blaming it on a ghost?  Edwards a/k/a Castle sets up a great mystery.  Although fans of Gothic tales will pretty much guess what is going on long before the reveal in the final chapters, it is still a great read with some engaging characters and perfectly-paced suspense.

 

There is no signature on the cover art, so it is not possible to say who painted the cover.   It is definitely one of the better Gothic covers I've seen, with poor Elinora shivering as she looks back at the terror-filled Elswick Manor.  The barren tree limbs, the ocean waves crashing against the cliff side, and the rolling fog around the mansion blend together to create a scene that would give anyone goosebumps!  There is also no credit given to the artist who provided the interior illustrations, which is a shame.  The black and white illustrations throughout the book are so wonderfully rendered, filled with exquisite detail, they nearly come alive off the page!  From the rendition of the towering manor on page 17 to the scenes of the interior of the great house on pages 43, 62, and 83 (shown to the right, here), the artist manages to bring life to the words on the pages, and one can easily picture themselves there in the manor with Elinora!  The final illustration, a drawing of the White Lady terrorizing poor Prudence, it truly frightening - I did not show it here, as I do not want to spoil it for anyone who wants to read this book.  That face is straight out of a horror movie!

 

One thing I did find extremely odd about this book was the transition from Chapter 10 to Chapter 11 - or, to be more accurate, the complete lack of transition.  In fact, the last sentence of Chapter 10 does not even end; rather, it carries directly into the first line of Chapter 11:

She reached it just as Prudence did.  They both stared down at it as it was washed to and fro against

 

Chapter Eleven

 

the sands by the gentle movement of the incoming tide.  The bloated and distorted features of what was once a man lay face upwards... 

(pp. 176-77).

 

I have to say, I have never in my life seen a book that starts a new chapter in the middle of a sentence.  I am unsure if this was intentional on the part of the author or the publisher, or this was merely a printing error, or what.  In fact, the end of the first paragraph in Chapter 11 seems more like the ending point of Chapter 10, because the second paragraph of Chapter 11 has a bit of a time and spatial jump, going from the rocky beach to the parlor of Elswick Manor hours after the body was found.  I'm aware there are other editions of this book (I believe it was later re-published under the Linford Romance Library line of books in the 1990s), so I wonder if those editions have this same transition, or if it was corrected.

 

In any event, The Captain's Lady turned out to be a wonderful read, and I'll certainly be keeping my eye out for any more of Brenda Castle's Gothic novels under whatever pseudonym she chose to use!

 

RATING:  9 coarse kerseymere gowns out of 10 for pure Gothic suspense in the vein of Dark Shadows