Irene Adler: Chapel Noir Part 60

My right hand feels the th.o.r.n.y bulk of my chatelaine, my left the wad of a notebook.

They have left me unmolested, despite my memory of the madman with the eyes of a dead devil and the groping hands.

My stomach spasms. Sick.

I will go mad.

If I do not die in my own vomit.

Perhaps I can move a finger to find the slit of my pocket.

There!

Perhaps I can work out the small knife on the chatelaine, cut a hole in this wood box and let some of the darkness out. In time.

I will go mad, cannot breathe in the dark, the close . . . !

My box is moving, taking me somewhere. Someone has seen to it.

Irene! She will be frantic.

She will look for me.

But I am moving, in a box, on land, over water? Far away.

I will go mad if they do not let me out soon.

But . . . sleep is coming. Unnatural sleep. I fear it. Welcome it. I cannot go mad while I sleep.

My left hand finds the pocket slit and two fingers slip within after exhausting effort.

I will go mad, but I will write it all down at the first opportunity.

Afterword.

Now it should be obvious why I delayed in releasing what now lies before the reader, scholarly and popular alike.

I could plead the ma.s.sive amount of material. A daily diary, begun early and recording a preternaturally long life (also composed in the leisurely and convoluted sentences so popular in the nineteenth century), occupies numerous volumes, all written by hand. (And a painstakingly spidery hand Miss Huxleigh used, too. No wonder she needed spectacles, although I suspect that the needing of spectacles is what created the penmans.h.i.+p.) I could point out that a scholar like me charts an undiscovered country and must first make maps before she pens travelogues. I have not only had the heretofore unknown Huxleigh material to study and present in a logical manner, but newly discovered fragments from the Pink journals and remnants from the anonymous "Watcher."

Enormous as the task was, that alone did not cause the delay. I must admit to reading and researching the Huxleigh diaries in chronological order. I am as surprised as my readers with what the advancing years bring and, given Miss Huxleigh's volubility, they bring a good deal.

After much research I have determined that all of the details about the well-known individuals mentioned in this account tally with what is known of their lives and habits. True, their exact whereabouts during the second half of May of 1889 is not always possible to confirm.

A record does exist, however, that the Prince of Wales used at Madame Kelly's noted Paris establishment an elaborate siege d'amour made for him by an M. Soubrier in 1890. Such would be needed to replace a previous model defaced by the events described in Miss Huxleigh's diary. Apparently the Prince changed both his cabinetmaker and his favored brothel after the events of 1889.

Nellie Bly's account tallies with doc.u.mented events of her family life and reporting career. Although she was busily publis.h.i.+ng stories for the World of New York City in the spring of 1889, she had sufficient energy and enterprise (and telegraph communications were sophisticated enough then) that she could have slipped away to Europe on the trail of sensational subject matter, such as the legal brothels of Paris. She could have also briefly visited London during the previous autumn when Jack the Ripper was active.

The Prince of Wales formally opened l'Exposition universelle May 16, 1889, along with Buffalo Bill and his Wild West Show. Only Red Tomahawk has left little evidence; in that period the doings of native individuals were seldom recorded, sad to say.

Naturally, or unnaturally, details relating to the Jack the Ripper murders and suspects have been doc.u.mented and a.n.a.lyzed to infinity. The upholsterer Kelly was indeed a suspect and did indeed escape to France and Paris just after the last Whitechapel killing.

Given the extraordinary events and theories of these remarkable testimonies, I stand back, braced and ready, to take and return the fire of all who read this account and the one that follows and still dare to disbelieve. Castle Rouge, to be published in fall, 2002, will offer even more astounding revelations. The demands of research and verification, not to mention the quant.i.ty of the materials, prevent the presentation of these astonis.h.i.+ng events in one volume.

It is only fitting that I finish my labors for the first portion of this duology on the brink of the millennium, although about even that exact year the scholars can, and do, argue. At least they will be silent on that issue for another thousand years.

I suspect, however, that the Jack the Ripper debate will still be raging then.

Fiona Witherspoon, Ph.D., A.I.A. *

November 5, 2000.

* Advocates of Irene Adler.

Perhaps it has taken until the end of this century for an

author like Douglas to be able to imagine a female

protagonist who could be called "the" woman.

by Sherlock Holmes.

-GROUNDS FOR MURDER, 1991.

About this Reader's Group Guide.

To encourage the reading and discussion of Carole Nelson Douglas's acclaimed novels examining the Victorian world from the viewpoint of one of the most mysterious women in literature, the following descriptions and discussion topics are offered. The author interview, biography, and bibliography at the end will aid discussion as well.

Set in the period of 18801890 in London, Paris, Prague, and Monaco, the Irene Adler novels reinvent the only woman to have outwitted Sherlock Holmes as a complex and compelling protagonist. Douglas's portrayal of what the New York Times called "this remarkable heroine and her keen perspective on the male society in which she must make her independent way," recasts her "not as a loose-living adventuress but a woman ahead of her time." In Douglas's hands, the fascinating but sketchy American prima donna from "A Scandal in Bohemia" becomes an aspiring opera singer moonlighting as a private inquiry agent. When events force her from the stage into the art of detection, Adler's exploits rival those of Sherlock Holmes himself as she crosses paths and swords with the day's leading creative and political figures while sleuthing among the Bad and the Beautiful of Belle Epoque Europe.

Critics praise the novels' rich period detail, numerous historical and "semihistorical" characters, original perspective, wit, and "welcome window on things Victorian."

"The private and public escapades of Irene Adler Norton [are] as erratic and unexpected and brilliant as the character herself," noted Mystery Scene concerning Another Scandal in Bohemia (formerly Irene's Last Waltz), "a long and complex jeu d'esprit, simultaneously modeling itself on and critiquing Doyle-esque novels of ratiocination coupled with emotional distancing. Here is Sherlock Holmes in skirts; but as a detective with an artistic temperament and the pa.s.sion to match, with the intellect to penetrate to the heart of a crime and the heart to show compa.s.sion for the intellect behind it."

About This Book.

Chapel Noir, the fifth Irene Adler novel, opens in the Paris spring of 1889 as the controversial Eiffel tower is unveiled as the centerpiece of an elaborate world's fair. Irene Adler's barrister husband, G.o.dfrey Norton, is away on secret business for their patron, Baron de Rothschild. Irene's longtime companion, proper parson's daughter Penelope "Nell" Huxleigh, is shocked when the Baron asks Irene to investigate the brutal murders of two courtesans in a bordello patronized by aristocrats. The savagery recalls London's Whitechapel killings of autumn, 1888. Is Jacques the Ripper now terrorizing Paris?

For Discussion.

RELATED TO CHAPEL NOIR.

1. A theme of this novel is the double standard of s.e.xual behavior expected of, or tolerated in, men and women then, and by implication, now. How do the moral codes, or lack of them, of various men and women in this book reveal character? How do they compare to modern times?

2. If Nell is a "Watsonette" and Irene Adler takes the leading Sherlockian role, how does this pairing illuminate the mores of the times? Would this interplay be possible if Nell were not such an innocent? Is innocence a handicap for a woman in any time period? Do you think that the "moral watchdog" role, as taken on by Nell and treated with some satire by the author, could be a much more pernicious trait than it is portrayed as here? Where is the middle ground for moral women in society today?

3. Masquerade is a key element in the novel and the series, which features several unrevealed characters, many of whom keep secrets from each other. Is mystery fiction a pretext for revealing the mysteries of character as well as of crime? The Pink Cochrane sections tell the literal truth of an actual woman's life, yet would also explain how she became the "fallen woman" she seems to be. What attributes of the character made her take a pioneering path?

4. The character of Pink blends the worldly experience of Irene Adler with the innocence of Nell Huxleigh. Both Irene Adler and Sherlock Holmes are knowing of the world, but apparently have not been corrupted by it. Do you think Holmes is a virgin? If not, what is his s.e.xual history, and why? Does it matter, other than sp.a.w.ning decades of speculation and wishful thinking about Sherlock Holmes's s.e.x life? How does Mr. Spock of Star Trek fit into this literary mythos? Are women intrigued by logical, unemotional male figures, and, if so, why? How would this reflect inequality in society?

5. In the nineteenth century, Paris hosted several impressive world's fairs and was known as a city of light and dark. Were you surprised by the city's numerous tourist attractions and by the appet.i.te for sensationalism in the displays of the wax museum and the Paris Morgue? How do these trends compare to the tabloid journalism and s.e.x and violence in electronic media-novels, films, music videos-of today?

6. This novel shows women pursuing the killer of women. Does it differ from other novels featuring the Ripper murders you may have read? Were you surprised that the Irving/Stoker theatrical circle knew about the l.u.s.tmurder studies of Krafft-Ebing? Did such knowledge influence Stoker's Gothic fiction, particularly Dracula? How does the double s.e.xual standard play into the notion of the supernaturally powerful man preying on women's bodies and blood? Do you see parallels to the Dracula story and characters in this novel? Why has Dracula become such a popular cultural touchstone, along with Jack the Ripper? How does this novel reference scenes and characters from Dracula, such as the madman Renfield and the three brides of Dracula? Do you see a difference in the fictional way a woman author and women characters approach the violence of the Ripper case? Does the partic.i.p.ation of Buffalo Bill and Red Tomahawk contrast or parallel the history of human savagery in New World and Old?

7. This story takes place on the brink of the 1890s, called the Mauve Decade, the Yellow Nineties, and the Decadent Nineties because of a cultural climate that was both artistically fruitful and yet celebrated evil and darkness. What elements of decadence appear in this novel, besides actions relating to the murders? Is our own culture experiencing an end-of-century/end-of-millennium appet.i.te for dark entertainment? Is Hannibal Lecter the new Dracula?

8. Retellings of the Jack the Ripper crimes have made him into something of a heroic figure like Hannibal Lecter: cold, clever, and invincible, the center of endless fascination and even a kind of admiration for the very brutality of his deeds. Does this reflect an underlying misogynism in society? If the Ripper had butchered a series of men, would the crimes still be as famous?

RELATED TO THE IRENE ADLERO SERIES.

1. Douglas mentions other authors, many of them women, who have reinvented major female characters or minor characters from cla.s.sic literary or genre novels that reevaluate culture then and now. Can you think of such works in the field of fantasy or historical novels? General literature? What about the recent copyright contest over The Wind Done Gone, Alice Randall's reimagining of Gone with the Wind's events and characters from the African-American slaves' viewpoints? Could the novel's important social points have been made as effectively without referencing the cla.s.sic work generally familiar to most people? What other works have attained the mythic status that might make possible such socially conscious reinventions? Which would you rewrite?

2. Religion and morality are underlying issues in the novels, including the time's anti-Semitism. This is an element absent from the Holmes stories. How is this issue brought out and how do Nell's strictly conventional views affect those around her? Why does she remain both disapproving and fascinated by Irene's pragmatic philosophy? Why is Irene (and also most readers) so fond of her despite her limited opinions?

3. Why did Douglas choose to blend humor with the adventurous plots? Do comic characters and situations satirize the times, or soften them? Is humor a more effective form of social criticism than rhetoric? What other writers and novelists use this technique, besides George Bernard Shaw and Mark Twain?

4. The novels also present a continuing tension between New World and Old World, America and England and the Continent, artist/tradesman and aristocrat, as well as woman and man. Which characters reflect which camps? How does the tension show itself?

5. Chapel Noir makes several references to Dracula through the presence of Bram Stoker some six years before the novel actually was published. Stoker is also a continuing character in other Adler novels. Various literary figures appear in the Adler novels, including Oscar Wilde, and most of these historical characters knew each other. Why was this period so rich in writers who founded much modern genre fiction, like Doyle and Stoker? Why did this period produce not only Dracula and Doyle's Holmes stories and the surviving dinosaurs of The Lost World, but also Trilby and Svengali, The Phantom of the Opera, The Prisoner of Zenda, and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, among the earliest and most lasting works of science fiction, political intrigue, mystery, and horror? How does Douglas pay homage to this tradition in the plots, characters, and details of the Adler novels?

An Interview with Carole Nelson Douglas.

Q: You were the first woman to write about the Sherlock Holmes world from the viewpoint of one of Arthur Conan Doyle's women characters, and only the second woman to write a Holmes-related novel at all. Why?

A: Most of my fiction ideas stem from my role as social observer in my first career, journalism. One day I looked at the mystery field and realized that all post-Doyle Sherlockian novels were written by men. I had loved the stories as a child and thought it was high time for a woman to examine the subject from a female point of view.

Q: So there was "the woman," Irene Adler, the only woman to outwit Holmes, waiting for you.

A: She seems the most obvious candidate, but I bypa.s.sed her for that very reason to look at other women in what is called the Holmes Canon. Eventually I came back to "A Scandal in Bohemia." Rereading it, I realized that male writers had all taken Irene Adler at face value as the King of Bohemia's jilted mistress, but the story doesn't support that. As the only woman in the Canon who stirred a hint of romantic interest in the aloof Holmes, Irene Adler had to be more than this beautiful but amoral "Victorian vamp." Once I saw that I could validly interpret her as a gifted and serious performing artist, I had my protagonist.

Q: It was that simple?

A: It was that complex. Any deeper psychological exploration of this character still had to adhere to Doyle's story, both literally and in regard to the author's own feeling toward the character. That's how I ended up having to explain that operatic impossibility, a contralto prima donna. It's been great fun justifying Doyle's error by finding operatic roles Irene could conceivably sing. My Irene Adler is as intelligent, self-sufficient, and serious about her professional and personal integrity as Sherlock Holmes, and far too independent to be anyone's mistress but her own. She also moonlights as an inquiry agent while building her performing career. In many ways they are flip sides of the same coin: her profession, music, is his hobby. His profession, detection, is her secondary career. Her adventures intertwine with Holmes's, but she is definitely her own woman in these novels.

Q: How did Doyle feel toward the character of Irene Adler?

A: I believe that Holmes and Watson expressed two sides of Dr. Doyle: Watson the medical and scientific man, also the staunch upholder of British convention; Holmes the creative and bohemian writer, fascinated by the criminal and the bizarre. Doyle wrote cla.s.sic stories of horror and science fiction as well as hefty historical novels set in the age of chivalry. His mixed feelings of attraction and fear toward a liberated, artistic woman like Irene Adler led him to "kill" her as soon as he created her. Watson states she is dead at the beginning of the story that introduces her. Irene was literally too hot for Doyle as well as Holmes to handle. She also debuted (and exited) in the first Holmes/Watson story Doyle ever wrote. Perhaps Doyle wanted to establish an unattainable woman to excuse Holmes remaining a bachelor and aloof from matters of the heart. What he did was to create a fascinatingly unrealized character for generations of readers.

Q: Do your protagonists represent a split personality as well?

A: Yes, one even more sociologically interesting than the Holmes/Watson split because it embodies the evolving roles of women in the late nineteenth century. As a larger-than-life heroine, Irene is "up to anything." Her biographer, Penelope "Nell" Huxleigh, however, is the very model of traditional Victorian womanhood. Together they provide a seriocomic point-counterpoint on women's restricted roles then and now. Narrator Nell is the character who "grows" most during the series as the unconventional Irene forces her to see herself and her times in a broader perspective. This is something women writers have been doing in the past two decades: revisiting cla.s.sic literary terrains and bringing the sketchy women characters into full-bodied prominence.

Q: What of "the husband," G.o.dfrey Norton?

A: In my novels, Irene's husband, G.o.dfrey Norton, is more than the "tall, dark, and das.h.i.+ng barrister" Doyle gave her. I made him the son of a woman wronged by England's then female-punitive divorce law, so he is a "supporting" character in every sense of the word. These novels are that rare bird in literature: female "buddy" books. G.o.dfrey fulfills the useful, decorative, and faithful role so often played by women and wives in fiction and real life. Sherlockians anxious to unite Adler and Holmes have tried to oust G.o.dfrey. William S. Baring-Gould even depicted him as a wife-beater in order to promote a later a.s.signation with Holmes that produced Nero Wolfe! That is such an unbelievable violation of a strong female character's psychology. That scenario would make Irene Adler a two-time loser in her choice of men and a m.a.s.o.c.h.i.s.t to boot. My protagonist is a world away from that notion and a wonderful vehicle for subtle but sharp feminist comment.

Q: Did you give her any attributes not found in the Doyle story?

A: I gave her one of Holmes's bad habits. She smokes "little cigars." Smoking was an act of rebellion for women then. And because Doyle shows her sometimes donning male dress to go unhampered into public places, I gave her "a wicked little revolver" to carry. When Doyle put her in male disguise at the end of his story, I doubt he was thinking of the modern psychos.e.xual ramifications of cross-dressing.

Q: Essentially, you have changed Irene Adler from an ornamental woman to a working woman.

A: My Irene is more a rival than a romantic interest for Holmes. She is not a logical detective in the same mold as he, but is as gifted in her intuitive way. Nor is her opera singing a convenient profession for a beauty of the day, but a pa.s.sionate vocation that was taken from her by the King of Bohemia's autocratic att.i.tude toward women, forcing her to occupy herself with detection. Although Doyle's Irene is beautiful, well-dressed, and clever, my Irene demands that she be taken seriously despite these feminine attributes. Now we call it "Grrrrl Power."

I like to write "against" conventions that are no longer true, or were never true. This is the thread that runs through all my fiction: my dissatisfaction with the portrayal of women in literary and popular fiction-then and even now. This begins with Amberleigh-my postfeminist mainstream version of the Gothic revival popular novels of the 1960s and 1970s-and continues with Irene Adler today. I'm interested in women as survivors. Men also interest me of necessity, men strong enough to escape cultural blinders to become equal partners to strong women.

Q: How do you research these books?

A: From a lifetime of reading English literature and a theatrical background that educated me on the clothing, culture, customs, and speech of various historical periods. I was reading Oscar Wilde plays when I was eight years old. My mother's book club meant that I cut my teeth on Eliot, Balzac, Kipling, Poe, poetry, Greek mythology, Hawthorne, the Brontes, Dumas, and d.i.c.kens.

In doing research, I have a fortunate facility of using every nugget I find, or of finding that every little fascinating nugget works itself into the story. Perhaps that's because good journalists must be ingenious in using every fact available to make a story as complete and accurate as possible under deadline conditions. Often the smallest mustard seed of research swells into an entire tree of plot. The corpse on the dining-room table of Bram Stoker, author of Dracula, was too macabre to resist and spurred the entire plot of the third Adler novel, A Soul of Steel (formerly Good Morning, Irene). Stoker rescued a drowning man from the Thames and carried him home for revival efforts, but it was too late.

Besides using my own extensive library on this period, I've borrowed from my local library all sorts of arcane books they don't even know they have because no one ever checks them out. The Internet aids greatly with the specific fact. I've also visited London and Paris to research the books, a great hards.h.i.+p, but worth it. I also must visit Las Vegas periodically for my contemporary-set Midnight Louie mystery series. No sacrifice is too great.