barnabas collins – Page 15 – Dark Shadows Commentary

Episode 738: The rest of the truth

This episode ends with one of the most thrilling moments in all of Dark Shadows.

The show’s first supernatural menace was undead blonde fire witch Laura Murdoch Collins, who was on it from December 1966 to March 1967. Its second was vampire Barnabas Collins, who first appeared in April 1967. Laura herself was presented with many tropes that conventionally mark vampires; for example, they laid great emphasis on the fact that Laura was never seen eating or drinking. And Laura’s story was structured very much like Bram Stoker’s Dracula, with well-meaning governess Vicki taking Mina’s role as the driving force behind the opposition to her. Presumably, if Barnabas had been staked and destroyed as the original plan envisioned, Vicki would have led the fight against him as well, and in #275 driven the stake into his heart. But Barnabas brought the show a new audience, and so Vicki was never called on to go to battle with him. Her character withered and was written out, and he replaced her as its chief protagonist.

In early 1967, Vicki learned that Laura had appeared at least twice before, and had died in strikingly similar ways each time. In 1767, Laura Murdoch Stockbridge was burned to death with her young son David; in 1867, Laura Murdoch Radcliffe was burned to death with her young son David; and in 1967, Vicki found Laura Murdoch Collins beckoning her young son David to join her in the flames consuming a wooden building. At the last second, Vicki broke through David’s trance and he ran to her, escaping the flames.

In November 1967, the show established that Barnabas lived on the great estate of Collinwood as a human in 1795, and that he became a vampire as a result of the tragic events of that year. If Barnabas were the same age in 1795 that Jonathan Frid was in 1967, he would have been born late in 1752, meaning that he would have been a teenager when Laura Murdoch Stockbridge and little David Stockbridge went up in smoke. The Stockbridges were a very wealthy family, so they would likely have been on familiar terms with Barnabas and the other rich Collinses of Collinsport, and the deaths of Laura and David would have been one of the major events in the area in those days. So longtime viewers have been wondering ever since whether Barnabas knew Laura, and if so what he knew about her.

Now Barnabas has traveled back in time to the year 1897, and there he meets another incarnation of Laura. He is thunderstruck at the sight of her. In her bland, enigmatic way, she expresses curiosity about his reaction, and he collects himself sufficiently to make some flattering remarks about her beauty. As soon as he is alone with his blood thrall, Miss Charity Trask, he declares that Laura has been dead for over a hundred years. So has he, but apparently when a woman rises from the dead to prey on the living that’s different, somehow. We saw this same old double standard a couple of weeks ago, when libertine Quentin Collins expressed shock at Laura’s return from the dead, when he himself had died and been a zombie just the week before.

If Laura did know Barnabas when she was as she is now and he was an adolescent, it is no wonder she does not seem to recognize him. She knows that there is a Barnabas Collins on the estate, and has heard that he is a descendant of the eighteenth century bearer of the same name. She would expect him to resemble the boy she knew, but would not necessarily know what that boy looked like when he was in his forties.

This is the first time we’ve seen Charity since Barnabas bit her in #727. She lives in the town of Rockport, which in the 1960s was far enough away from Collinwood that in #521 it was worthy of note that you could dial telephone numbers there directly. In 1897, when automobiles were rare and roads weren’t made for the few that did exist, a long-distance relationship between vampire and blood thrall would seem quite impractical. Still, in #732 we saw a character make two round trips between Rockport and Collinwood in a single evening, so I suppose it could be managed.

Barnabas’ recognition of Laura is a fitting conclusion to a fine episode. Much of it is devoted to a three-cornered confrontation between Laura, her twelve year old son Jamison Collins, and her brother-in-law/ ex-lover/ mortal enemy, Quentin. Danny Horn analyzes this in his post about the episode at Dark Shadows Every Day. I recommend that post highly. All I would add is that as it plays out today, the confrontation makes me suspect that the writers of the show may have done more planning than Danny usually credits them with. Jamison is the only person Quentin loves, and so far we have seen that Jamison loves Quentin back. When he learns that Quentin is his mother’s foe, Jamison turns against Quentin. Barnabas traveled back in time after Quentin’s ghost had made life impossible for everyone in 1969. The evil of Quentin’s spirit fell heaviest on David Collins, whom Quentin had possessed, turned into another version of Jamison, and was in the process of killing. Nothing yet has explained why Quentin’s ghost would focus its malignity on the image of Jamison. Actress Diana Millay used to claim that Laura was added to the 1897 segment at the last minute because she told Dan Curtis she wanted to work, but Millay famously enjoyed testing the credulity of Dark Shadows fans with outlandish remarks. I wonder if a falling-out between Quentin and Jamison over Laura was in the flimsies all along.

Charity makes her first entrance in the great house of Collinwood. Quentin is apologizing to her for some boorish behavior when he realizes she hasn’t been listening to him at all. She is completely absorbed in the eighteenth century portrait of Barnabas that hangs in the foyer. She excuses herself and wafts out the front door.

In Barnabas’ house, Charity says that he makes her feel beautiful, and that she wants to see herself in a mirror. Barnabas is a bit sheepish about the particulars of vampirism, and so he changes the subject. We cut from this exchange to Laura’s room in the great house, where she is with a servant named Dirk whom she has enthralled to serve as a source of body heat. That scene opens with a shot in a mirror, making the point that Laura’s relationship with Dirk is a reflection of Barnabas’ relationship with Charity. Earlier, there had been a clumsy attempt at an artsy shot of Laura reflected in Quentin’s sherry glass. That does show us that Laura casts a reflection and that her relationship with Quentin has been affected by his drinking, but it calls too much attention to itself to do much more than that.

The portrait in the foyer is hugely important to Barnabas. It made its debut on the show in #204, the day before his name was first mentioned and more than a week before he himself premiered. His thralls stare at it and receive his commands through it. He himself uses it as a passport, appealing to his resemblance to it as proof that he is a descendant of its subject and therefore a member of the Collins family. Today, Barnabas is surprised when Charity comes to his house; he wasn’t transmitting a message through the portrait summoning her. Instead, it was functioning as another mirror, in which Charity, who has become a part of Barnabas, could see the motivating force within her own personality.

Dirk is played by Roger Davis, a most unappealing actor. At one point he makes this face while Dirk is involved in some kind of mumbo-jumbo:

Screenshot by Dark Shadows Before I Die.

At one point today, Quentin tells Jamison that he shouldn’t be afraid of telling the servants what to do, since after all he will someday be the master of Collinwood. Jamison takes this altogether too much to heart, and spends the rest of the episode ordering everyone around. David Henesy is a good enough actor to extract the comic value from this. For example, when he turns to Quentin, says “I’ll talk to you later!,” and keeps walking, we laughed out loud.

Episode 732: The possessor and the possessed

This episode features two undead blonde fire witches. Laura Collins was Dark Shadows‘ first supernatural menace when she was on the show from December 1966 to March 1967. In those days, the show was set in contemporary times, and it was slow-paced and heavy on atmosphere. Laura began as a vague, enigmatic presence and gradually came into focus as a dynamic villain.

Now the show is fast-paced, action-packed, and set in the year 1897. Laura is once again the estranged wife of the eldest brother of the matriarch of the great estate of Collinwood. This time, she has come back to Collinwood after running off with her husband’s brother, Quentin. Unlike her 1960s iteration, this Laura is not at all happy about the periodic immolations that renew her existence as a humanoid Phoenix. She bears a grudge against Quentin for betraying her to the priests of a secret cult in Alexandria, Egypt, who incinerated her some months before. For his part, Quentin is shocked that Laura is alive now. When he tries to remedy the situation by strangling Laura, a feeling of intense heat overwhelms him and he collapses.

The other undead blonde fire witch is Angelique, who was first on the show from November 1967 to March 1968, when it was set in the 1790s. She appeared in 1897 when Quentin and one of his fellow Satanists conjured her up out of the fireplace in the caretaker’s cottage on the grounds of Collinwood in #711. They wanted a demon to come from the depths of Hell and help them do battle with Quentin’s distant cousin, the mysterious Barnabas Collins. Unknown to Quentin, Barnabas is a vampire and Angelique is the witch who originally made him one. Barnabas has traveled back in time to prevent Quentin becoming a ghost who will ruin things for everyone at Collinwood in 1969. Angelique is delighted to find herself back at Collinwood. She is determined to make Barnabas love her, no matter how many of his friends and relatives she has to kill along the way.

As it turns out, it was Angelique who caused Quentin to collapse before he could kill Laura. She summons Barnabas and tells him she will let Quentin die unless he lives with her as man and wife. When Angelique points out that if Quentin dies now, the results will be disastrous for the Collinses of 1969, Barnabas capitulates.

Barnabas takes Angelique to the great house. There, he introduces her to governess Rachel Drummond as his fianceé. Rachel has been falling in love with Barnabas, and their relationship has been the only bright spot in the otherwise extremely stressful time she has had at Collinwood. At one point today Rachel is on the telephone to someone she and Barnabas both hate; Barnabas takes it upon himself to press on the hook, hanging the phone up in the middle of the conversation. Many men do this to women in Dark Shadows, and it is usually very clear that the women don’t like it at all. Rachel objects only mildly, and quickly accepts it. That she isn’t bothered by such an aggressive act suggests that she already feels a very strong bond with Barnabas.

When Rachel hears that Barnabas is committed to someone else, she rushes out as quickly as possible. Later, Barnabas will meet her on the terrace and intimate that his relationship with Angelique is not what it seems. Rachel does not quite know what to make of this, but at moments we catch her rolling her eyes like someone who knows malarkey when she hears it.

Rachel listening to Barnabas explain that they shouldn’t let his fianceé come between them. Screenshot by Dark Shadows Before I Die.

Angelique wakes Quentin. They talk about Laura. By magical means, Angelique discovers that Laura’s life depends on an Egyptian urn that she keeps with her at all times. This is another retcon; we saw every worldly possession Laura had in 1966, and there was no urn in sight. Quentin resolves to find this urn and destroy it, ridding himself of Laura forever.

Episode 728: Mother is coming home

Repressed patrician Edward Collins enters his study in the great house on the estate of Collinwood and finds his brother, libertine Quentin, riffling through his desk. Quentin does not feel an obligation to apologize for going through Edward’s things since Edward is among the conspirators holding Quentin’s estranged wife, madwoman Jenny, prisoner somewhere in the house. Quentin learned that Jenny was around only when she escaped from her cell and stabbed him. He is looking for information about where she is now so that she will not get another chance at him. Edward says that Quentin does not need to know where Jenny is, since he is confident she will not escape again.

Quentin is not at all reassured by Edward’s promise. He brings up another topic, Edward’s own estranged wife. For the first several weeks of the portion of Dark Shadows set in the year 1897, the audience was led to believe that Jenny was Edward’s wife, and the mother of his children, twelve year old Jamison and nine year old Nora. When we found out that Jenny was Quentin’s wife, we wondered not only who Edward was married to, but also whether Jenny had borne children by Quentin. After all, she is obsessed with her “babies,” and in #707 we learned that the enterprise of concealing Jenny’s presence in the house involved taking substantial sums of money into the village of Collinsport and giving them to a Mrs Fillmore. Perhaps Mrs Fillmore is taking care of Jenny and Quentin’s children.

Today, Quentin mentions that Edward’s wife, whom Edward said in #705 and says again today “no longer exists” as far as he is concerned, is named Laura. This rings a very loud bell for longtime viewers. The first supernatural menace to dominate the plot of Dark Shadows was Laura Murdoch Collins, estranged wife of high-born ne’er-do-well Roger Collins. That Laura was on the show from December 1966 to March 1967. In the first week of the show, newly hired governess Vicki was surprised to learn that Roger’s wife was still alive, and was told in no uncertain terms that she was not to be discussed. In #705, during the first week of the 1897 portion, newly hired governess Rachel Drummond was surprised to learn that Edward’s wife was still alive, and was told in no uncertain terms that she was not to be discussed. Like Roger, Edward is played by Louis Edmonds. When we learn that Edward’s wife, too, is named Laura, we can only assume that she, too will prove to be an undead fire witch out to incinerate her children for the sake of her own immortality.

Quentin reminds Edward that Laura followed him the year before when he was banished from Collinwood. Indeed, Laura followed Quentin all the way to Alexandria, Egypt. The other day, Quentin admitted to Jamison that he had been a police spy in that city. Edward does not want to hear about any of it.

Nora enters. She asks Edward if she can use his desk to draw with crayons. Edward says that he was just leaving, and she can do what she wants. Quentin stays behind with her for a moment. Nora asks her uncle if he thinks her mother will come back. He looks uncomfortable, says he doesn’t know, and exits.

Barnabas Collins, a distant cousin recently arrived from someplace far away, enters. He looks at what Nora has drawn and recognizes Egyptian hieroglyphics. He asks if she copied them out of a book; she says that they just popped into her head. He says he wonders what they mean; she looks directly into the camera and tells the audience she knows exactly what they mean. They say that her mother is coming home soon. And indeed, they do include actual hieroglyphic symbols for “Mother,” “Come,” and “Home.”

Nora is quite the scribe. Screenshot by Dark Shadows Before I Die.

Nora starts talking about her mother. Barnabas encourages her to continue with the topic, and Edward enters. Edward is quite stern with Barnabas; he had made it clear that his wife was not to be discussed with anyone in the house, least of all with his children. Barnabas explains that Nora brought her mother up. He goes on to show Edward the drawing and tell him that he finds it profoundly disturbing. Edward accepts that as a sufficient excuse for going along with Nora while she talks about her mother, but he attributes the drawing to Quentin’s influence.

Whenever we saw Laura alone indoors during the “Phoenix” storyline, she was staring blankly into a fire burning in a hearth. She kept urging her son, strange and troubled boy David, to join her in this pastime, and every time he did we were led to believe that she had taken a sizable step towards her terrible goal. Now we see Nora in the drawing room, staring into the fire that always burns in its hearth.

Nora hears gurgling noises, like indistinct voices rising from below or behind the fire. Frightened, she runs into the foyer, into her father’s arms. She tries to explain to Edward what she heard, and he insists there is nothing to be afraid of. He carries her into the drawing room, where he declares they will look into the fire together and will both realize that nothing out of the ordinary is going on. His plan fails when Nora sees a face wearing a blonde wig starting to take shape in the flames. Nora cries out that it is her mother’s face. We pan to Edward. He is also looking into the fire, and he looks shocked. We wonder whether he is shocked because he can also see the face, or if he is merely alarmed by Nora’s reaction.

Roger and his sister Liz, the adults in the generation of Collinses who live at Collinwood in the 1960s, are Jamison’s children. So Edward and Laura are their grandparents. If this Laura is indeed the same immortal humanoid Phoenix who was David’s mother, Roger therefore married his own grandmother. In #313, Roger had a line about his “ancestors,” which Louis Edmonds bobbled. When he said “incestors,” he giggled, repeated the misspoken word, then corrected himself, calling the maximum possible attention to his error. Many fans bring that rather bizarre blooper up when we come to this story. The writing staff picked up ideas wherever they could, and I suppose the cast’s line difficulties might have been as good a source as any.

Episode 727: The lost lamb

Well-meaning time-traveler/ bloodsucking abomination from the depths of Hell Barnabas Collins has found himself in the year 1897, where he must take action to prevent his distant cousin Quentin from becoming a malevolent ghost who will ruin everything for everyone on the estate of Collinwood in 1969. He has no idea what that action will be, so has decided to intrude as aggressively as he can in as much of the family’s business as he can until something turns up.

At the moment, Barnabas is strenuously trying to keep Judith Collins, the mistress of Collinwood, from sending her twelve year old nephew Jamison to a boarding school called Worthington Hall. Worthington Hall is run by the Rev’d Gregory Trask, a descendant of one of Barnabas’ old nemeses. Yesterday, Trask had an unsettling encounter with Jamison during which the camera dwelt heavily on Jamison’s nervous habit of fiddling with his belt, prompting us to wonder why Trask gives Jamison the feeling that he ought to make very sure he remains fully clothed.

Today, Trask’s daughter Charity shows up. Nancy Barrett, who previously played the sometimes-capricious, always likable heiress Carolyn and the fragile, highly comic heiress Millicent, makes Charity just as imposing a heavy as her father.

Jamison’s governess, neurotic intellectual Rachel Drummond, tells Barnabas that she was a student at Worthington Hall for many years, and that the place was gruesome. The Trasks kept the children separated from one another, locked them in cupboards for weeks on end when they incurred their displeasure, and generally exploited and abused them. She herself was forced to stay at the school as a teacher when Trask lied to her and claimed that she owed him money, and she escaped with the aid of a fellow sufferer.

Trask confronts Rachel in the drawing room. She tries to stand up for herself, but he breaks her resistance down expertly. Trask’s one moment of weakness comes when he starts talking about Rachel’s lovely hair, and he suddenly turns away. The mask has slipped, and the audience has seen that Trask’s interest in Rachel is sexual. But Rachel is too intimidated to recognize what has happened, and when he resumes his righteous tone she crumbles. When she next sees Barnabas, she rushes away in tears.

Rachel is terrified by Trask. Screenshot by Dark Shadows Before I Die.

Rachel had another traumatic experience over the last few days. Quentin died, turned into a zombie, and abducted her. No one has given her the news yet, but Quentin came back to life yesterday. She is horrified when he comes into the drawing room and sees Quentin. At first he takes on a lumbering gait, and she screams. Then he laughs and starts walking normally. He explains what happened, as best he can, and they have a strangely pleasant conversation. Again, this is a testament to the high quality of the acting. It is hard to imagine that anyone less charming than David Selby could make us believe a woman would be so comfortable with Quentin after what Rachel has been through.

Barnabas takes on the form of a bat and bites Charity in her bedroom. Presumably he does this so that he can use her as an agent against her father. This raises the question of why he didn’t just bite Trask and put an end to the whole thing. Of course, the real-world explanation is that the writers wanted to keep the story going, but usually they take care to maneuver Barnabas into a situation where he is compelled to bite one person rather than another. So it’s rather sloppy to end the episode this way.

Still, this is a very good installment. Too good for some viewers; my wife, Mrs Acilius, refuses to watch the Gregory Trask episodes, because Jerry Lacy plays him so effectively that it ruins her day to spend half an hour in the presence of such an overpowering evil. Kathryn Leigh Scott brings Rachel’s self-doubts and final defeat vividly to life as well. By the time I got to the end of their scene, I was shouting at the screen “Bring back the zombies and werewolves and witches!” So I cheered when Barnabas bit Charity.

Episode 726: A boy’s dislike

When Dark Shadows began in June 1966, strange and troubled boy David Collins (David Henesy) was frantically afraid that he would be sent away from the great house of Collinwood. In #10, David overheard his father Roger (Louis Edmonds) telling his aunt Elizabeth Collins Stoddard (Joan Bennett) that they ought to do just that. As the owner of the house and holder of all the family’s wealth, it is up to Liz to make the decision. Hearing his father press to send him away, David responded by sabotaging the brakes on Roger’s car, nearly killing him.

Roger told Liz that David belonged in an “institution,” but David was just as terrified when it was suggested that he might go to an ordinary school. It was not entirely clear why he had this attitude. David and Roger had only lived in the vast gloomy house for a few weeks when the show started. Roger openly hated David, as did Liz’ daughter Carolyn. Liz loved him, but as a recluse and an aging grande dame had little in common with a young boy. Moreover, David hated his governess, the well-meaning Vicki, as much as he could hate any school. His mother, who did not live in the house and whose name was in those days was never to be mentioned there, was the only person for whom David expressed fondness; when in #15 David watched Roger drive off in the car whose brakes he had sabotaged, we saw him standing by himself, saying “He’s going to die, mother. He’s going to die!” So it is difficult to see why David was so intensely committed to staying at Collinwood.

Today, we see a suggestion that David may have been influenced by an ancestral memory of bad times at a boarding school. It is 1897, and David’s grandfather Jamison Collins (David Henesy) is twelve. Jamison’s father Edward (Louis Edmonds) has asked the Rev’d Mr Gregory Trask to come to Collinwood to urge his sister, Judith Collins (Joan Bennett,) to send Jamison and his nine-year old sister Nora to be students at Worthington Hall, a boarding school Trask runs. As the house’s owner and holder of all the family’s wealth, it is up to Judith to make the decision.

Trask wins Judith’s confidence by performing a ceremony after which Jamison and her brother, Jamison’s uncle Quentin, are restored to themselves after a spell that had made Quentin a zombie and put his spirit in possession of Jamison. Recently arrived, thoroughly mysterious distant cousin Barnabas Collins sputters with rage at the very sight of Trask, and exasperates Judith with his insistence that Trask is evil. Judith does not trust Barnabas, and Barnabas’ inability to either explain or contain his hostility only confirms her favorable judgment of Trask.

Once Quentin and Jamison are themselves again, Trask sends Barnabas and Quentin out of the drawing room. Quentin raises his eyebrows in response to Trask’s order and asks his sister “Are you sure you’re still in charge of this house, Judith?” She does not respond.

Judith makes a remark about Quentin’s influence on Jamison, saying that “He’s been like this ever since [Quentin] came home.” Since Jamison was just freed from possession a few minutes before, it is unclear what she could mean, and Jamison objects “That’s not true!” Trask unctuously replies “Now, your aunt does not tell lies, Jamison.” Returning viewers know that Judith lies constantly. Nor is Trask unaware that Judith is less than perfectly truthful. When he first arrived in Friday’s episode, Judith and Barnabas tried to conceal the situation with Quentin and Jamison from him, and she told a series of lies in pursuit of that objective.

When Jamison continues his attempts to tell the truth, Trask silences him with “Now, there is only one who is constantly right, Jamison, and He is not on this earth, but above. Now, I want you to go out into the hall and consider all the wonderful things your aunt has done for you recently. I am sure you will have much to think about.” Jerry Lacy brings such an inflexible authority to Trask’s personality that we cannot imagine a rebuttal to this sanctimonious little speech. We share Jamison’s helplessness and frustration.

Alone with Trask, Judith agrees to let him take Jamison and Nora to Worthington Hall. Jamison barges back in and declares that he will not go. Trask assures him that he will not take him unless he is willing to go. He then obtains Judith’s permission to talk with Jamison alone in his room.

While Jamison is taking Trask upstairs, we cut to the study. Quentin and Barnabas are alone there. Quentin asks Barnabas if Trask really was his “savior.” Barnabas replies “Apparently.” Quentin asks Barnabas what he thinks really happened; he sidesteps the question. Quentin keeps probing for Barnabas’ interpretation of his recent experience; Barnabas alludes to Quentin’s adventures in Satanism, saying “You dabble in odd things, perhaps one of your interests resulted in this.” Quentin observes that this is “Delicately put,” and goes on to remark on “what an interesting life” he has had.

Barnabas then takes his turn as the questioner. He asks Quentin about his wife, a tall, beautiful, homicidally crazed woman named Jenny who is being held prisoner somewhere in the house. Quentin grows tense, and does not give direct answers. He explodes at Barnabas, saying that he has no interest in making a friend of him. Barnabas observes that he has in fact made an effort to turn him into an enemy; Quentin interjects “Your fault!” Barnabas says they could be useful to each other; Quentin exclaims “Wrong!” When he thinks of Barnabas, Quentin says, only one question comes to mind- “What does he want from me?”

Jonathan Frid said that his favorite scene in Dark Shadows was one he had with Anthony George in #301. Barnabas tells local man Burke Devlin that their relationship to each other is like that of “two superb swordsmen with highly sharpened blades. You thrust, and I parry. I thrust, you parry.” That scene has never impressed me. The Barnabas/ Burke conflict did not have enough grounding in the story to come to life, and having the characters tell the audience that they were like “superb swordsmen” does not make it so. But this showdown really does pay off. Barnabas and Quentin are the show’s two great breakout stars, and we are in the middle of a long run of episodes where everything works. This scene brings out all the values they might have hoped that Burke and Barnabas’ confrontation would put on screen when they planned it.

We return to Jamison’s room, the same bedroom David Collins occupied in the 1960s. Trask is still being friendly. When Jamison says that he would miss his pony if he had to go away to Worthington Hall, Trask says “You must bring him with you!” When Jamison refuses to tell Trask his pony’s name, the friendliness vanishes. Trask darkens, tells him “You’re going to have to learn to answer questions, boy,” and insists they pray together. When Jamison resists, Trask tells him that he must change his ways lest he go on being a disappointment to his father. Jamison protests that his father loves him, and Trask asks incredulously “Does he?” He asks Jamison if he wants his soul to be saved. Jamison can’t very well say anything but yes to that, and so Trask says “Then I think I can help you.” Jamison is trapped.

After a scene in the drawing room where Quentin demands Judith tell him where Jenny is locked up, we return to Jamison’s room. The scene begins with a closeup of the rope belt of Jamison’s robe. Jamison is retying it. He keeps fiddling with it, perhaps a nervous habit, but it is the first thing we see and they hold the shot for a long time. We cannot but wonder whether the belt was untied at some point while Jamison and Trask were alone off camera.

Trask orders Jamison to tell Judith that he wants to go to Worthington Hall; Jamison says he will not. The dialogue does not explain how Jamison’s robe came undone, and neither he nor Trask seems concerned with the matter. Their blasé attitude turns an uncomfortable image into a lingering mystery.

In the drawing room, Trask announces to Judith that Jamison has something to say. Jamison says that Trask threatened him and tried to make him lie. Trask says that Judith will have to find another school for him, and she declares that she will not. Jamison will go to Worthington Hall.

Trask exits. Jamison finds Quentin and asks him to help him escape the grim fate in store for him. Quentin promises to do so, and by the end of the episode Jamison will be safely hidden somewhere in the house. Meanwhile, Barnabas throws a fit before Judith, saying that he cannot understand why “You would believe that maniac before you believe Jamison.” Judith scolds him and tells him to treat Trask with respect.

Trask returns. Barnabas asks him if his family is from Salem, Massachusetts. Trask affirms that it is so. Barnabas claims to have seen ink drawings of a Rev’d Trask who was at Collinwood in the 1790s; Trask says that he was his ancestor. He says that the earlier Rev’d Trask disappeared shortly after leaving Collinwood, and that his disappearance was never explained.

Longtime viewers know that Barnabas is a vampire who lived in the 1790s, and that the original Trask is one of those he blames for the many misfortunes that befell the family in those days, including his own transformation into a bloodsucking abomination. We remember the first Trask as a case study of a type much on people’s minds in the 1960s, Eric Hoffer’s “True Believer.” That Trask was so deeply and unshakably convinced of his own understanding of the situation around him that when he set out on a witch hunt, the real witch was easily able to manipulate him into doing her work for her. Barnabas murdered the original Trask in #442 by bricking him up in an alcove, one of the most famous moments in all of Dark Shadows. He seems pleased to hear that people are still wondering what became of the late witchfinder.

Gregory Trask seems to be a different sort. He can change his tune in a way that his forebear never could, putting on a friendly mask when it serves his interests to do so. While the original Trask was single-mindedly trying to live up to his own twisted idea of virtue, the second sometimes responds to bad news with a delighted grin, suggesting that he sees an opportunity to profit from it. The first Trask’s fanaticism sometimes led him to hypocrisy, when he thought that his ends were so good that they justified dishonest means, but this Trask seems to be a hypocrite who has kidded himself into acting like a fanatic. Mr Lacy’s performance makes him a formidable presence; the writers have made him a powerful adversary.

Episode 725: Imagination, properly channeled

In April 1967, Barnabas Collins showed up at the great house of Collinwood, home of Elizabeth Collins Stoddard and her family. Liz (Joan Bennett) was isolated, embattled, and under the control of a blackmailer. When a courtly gentleman claiming to be a distant cousin from England showed up, apparently wanting nothing from her but her friendship, she quickly accepted him, even giving him the Old House on the estate to live in. As Barnabas’ eccentricities became ever more difficult to ignore and bizarre and terrible events piled up around him, Liz steadfastly refused to entertain the idea that Barnabas might be anything less than perfectly trustworthy. Since Barnabas was in fact a vampire escaped from his grave to prey upon the living, this refusal tended to push Liz further and further to the fringes of the story.

Now Barnabas has traveled back in time to the year 1897. Joan Bennett again plays the mistress of Collinwood. Like Liz, spinster Judith Collins has agreed to let Barnabas stay in the Old House and do some work on it, presumably at his own expense. Unlike her, Judith is not desperate for friendship, and she is not at all sure Barnabas is someone she should trust.

Today, Joan Bennett is in closeup while a recorded monologue in her voice tells us what Judith thinks of Barnabas:

What is happening to all of us? Until Barnabas arrived, everything seemed the same. But what has Barnabas to do with it? Something, something, I’m sure. He knows too much, he’s involved himself so quickly, as if he were the center of it.

Judith trying to figure out Barnabas. Screenshot by Dark Shadows Before I Die.

Had Liz ever thought in those terms for one second, Barnabas would have been exposed and destroyed and Dark Shadows would have gone back to telling stories about the Collins family cannery. But 1897 is a more dynamic setting, in which no one has much time to wonder where Barnabas goes during the daylight hours or why he keeps his cellar door locked.

Today’s great crisis concerns Judith’s brother Quentin and her twelve year old nephew Jamison. Quentin died the other day, which you might expect to mark an ending of sorts. But as it happens, his body is roaming about as a zombie and his spirit has taken possession of Jamison. Yesterday Judith permitted Barnabas to do some mumbo-jumbo that lured Quentin back to his coffin, and, with the help of Judith’s surviving brother Carl, Barnabas buried Quentin and filled the grave with cement. But before the episode was over, Quentin had made his way out of the ground and abducted governess Rachel Drummond. For his part, Jamison is still possessed.

Today, Barnabas announces to Judith that she must let him take Jamison to Quentin’s grave, where he will perform another ceremony. Judith is appalled, as one might expect her to be, but yields to him. By the time Barnabas and Jamison come back to the great house, Judith is entertaining a visitor. He is the Rev’d Mr Gregory Trask.

When longtime viewers see Jerry Lacy wearing a cassock, they will expect to hear Trask’s name and title. Mr Lacy played another Rev’d Trask from December 1967 to March 1968, when Dark Shadows was set in the 1790s, the period when Barnabas first became a vampire. That Trask was a fanatical witchfinder whose zeal was matched only by his ineptitude. Wicked witch Angelique was able to manipulate Trask for her own purposes, and he earned Barnabas’ most cordial hatred.

When Barnabas sees Gregory Trask, he blurts out his surname. Puzzled, Trask asks if they have met. Barnabas does not answer, but immediately begins to display his hostility towards the newcomer. Barnabas is a poor tactician who has a habit of volunteering to his enemies exactly what he thinks of them. His interactions with the first Trask were a case in point, and we see him falling into the same pattern with this second.

Trask has come to Collinwood at the invitation of Judith’s brother Edward, father of Jamison and of nine year old Nora. Just four weeks ago Edward brought Rachel to the great house to be Nora and Jamison’s governess; last we saw, in #715, Edward was optimistic Rachel would work out well in her position. But now he has called Trask to come and take the children away to a school he operates, eliminating the need for a governess.

With Quentin lumbering around the house and Jamison spouting off about his possession, Judith and Barnabas cannot keep Trask from figuring out what is going on. He sits Quentin in a chair, intimidates Jamison into kneeling, sends Barnabas and Judith out of the drawing room, and starts praying for help. When Barnabas tries to enter, Trask tells him he can do nothing but help the devil, and slams the doors in his face. Judith and Barnabas are left standing in the foyer, wondering what will happen.

Episode 723: A mindless hulk

Quentin Collins is dead, his sister Judith would have you know. Their brother Carl is not so sure, but Carl is quite daft. So when high-strung governess Rachel Drummond reports that Quentin has taken a seat in the rocking chair in her bedroom, Judith is exasperated. She orders Carl to stop quivering and go into Rachel’s room himself to look at the rocking chair. Carl obeys Judith, and sees that the chair is vacant. Judith then orders Rachel to accompany her to the drawing room to see Quentin resting in his coffin. To Judith’s consternation, they see that the coffin is empty.

Judith and Rachel wonder who is playing morbid games with Quentin’s corpse. Of all the residents of the great house on the estate of Collinwood, Carl would seem to be the most obvious suspect. He is not only mentally unbalanced, but is also an inveterate prankster whose practical jokes are often disturbingly unpleasant. However, Carl is quick to break into maniacal laughter when he sees that the targets of his japes are uncomfortable, and he is not laughing now. He seems to be quite sincerely terrified. So Judith sends Carl upstairs to see if the body has been returned to Rachel’s room.

While the ladies are alone in the drawing room, Judith and Carl’s distant cousin Barnabas arrives. Judith tells Barnabas what has happened. When Judith expresses puzzlement as to how a dead body could be moved in and out of Rachel’s bedroom without using the door to the corridor, Barnabas mentions that there is a secret panel in the room. Judith is startled. She asks Barnabas how he, who only arrived from England a few weeks before, could possibly know about that panel. He claims that he read a “rare volume” by “the architect of Collinwood.” Judith does not seem entirely convinced, but she lets this explanation pass unchallenged.

Carl does not find the body in Rachel’s room, but he does notice something behind the drapes in the corridor. He pulls them apart to see Quentin. Carl screams. Quentin lumbers towards Carl and begins strangling him. Carl collapses, and Quentin leaves him on the floor.

Carl comes to in the drawing room. He tells Barnabas, Judith, and Rachel what happened. Judith cannot believe that Quentin has risen from the grave, and Barnabas takes it upon himself to tell her about zombies. He claims to have seen a zombie and to have witnessed ceremonies used to put them to rest while he was a young man on the island of Martinique.

Barnabas shocks everyone with his arcane knowledge. Screenshot by Dark Shadows Before I Die.

Judith agrees to let Barnabas try his mumbo-jumbo. While the ladies are upstairs, Barnabas and Carl are in the drawing room, burning some potpourri next to Quentin’s coffin. Quentin comes lumbering in, and they withdraw to the shadows. The fun Jonathan Frid and John Karlen had working together is one of the most enjoyable things to see on Dark Shadows, but they get a little bit carried away in the moment when Barnabas and Carl hide. As they scurry off, they are so obviously a couple of kids playing that we are distracted from their otherwise outstanding performances.

Quentin comes back and resumes his place in the coffin. At Judith’s insistence, Carl and Barnabas bury the coffin on the grounds and pour cement over it. Judith assures Rachel that this means Quentin will not come back. Rachel is disappointed when Judith says she believes that Barnabas has gone back to the Old House on the estate, where he is staying. Since they have had such an exhausting night and it is almost dawn, Judith assumes that Barnabas will want to go to bed. Judith herself does retire.

Barnabas comes back and tells Rachel that he had to make sure she was all right. She thanks him, and says that during the day she will be leaving Collinwood, never to return. He asks her to reconsider. He says that he wants to see her again, but that he has to leave immediately and he cannot possibly return until the following night. He will not tell her why. Regular viewers know that Barnabas is a vampire and that he will turn to dust if he doesn’t get back into his coffin in a few minutes and stay there until sundown. Barnabas doesn’t seem to think that his relationship with Rachel has come to a point at which he can share secrets like that with her, so he evades her questions and rushes off. Rachel heads upstairs.

We see the doors open by themselves and hear the wind. Thinking Barnabas has returned, Rachel hurries down. Baffled that no one is there, she goes outside. She turns and sees Quentin. He plods towards her, and she faints into his arms. This impressively well choreographed movement brings us to a dramatic conclusion.

Episode 721: If he stays dead now

Well-meaning time-traveler/ bloodsucking fiend Barnabas Collins enters a cottage on the grounds of the estate of Collinwood to find thuggish groundskeeper Dirk Wilkins standing over the freshly stabbed corpse of the rakish Quentin Collins. Since Quentin’s cause of death is a long-bladed thrusting dagger, a weapon also known as a “dirk,” it would seem clear that Wilkins is the culprit. But as it happens, Barnabas saw Wilkins enter the cottage a moment before, so he can be fairly sure he did not kill Quentin.

Nonetheless, Barnabas threatens to go to the police and accuse Wilkins unless he answers “a lot of questions.” Barnabas doesn’t have any witnesses to back up his version of events, and though he claims to be a relative of the ancient and esteemed Collins family he only arrived in town a few weeks before. But Wilkins isn’t hard to intimidate, so he answers some of Barnabas’ questions about madwoman Jenny Collins. Most importantly, he tells Barnabas that Jenny is the estranged wife of Quentin, not of Quentin’s brother Edward as the audience had been led to believe in the four weeks leading up to Friday’s episode.

As Wilkins, actor Roger Davis has been getting very careless with his lines. Jonathan Frid always had a lot of trouble with his own dialogue, but he is clearly sticking with the script in an exchange like this:

Wilkins: Mr. Collins, you gotta understand that she’s crazy in the head! She could hurt herself — or somebody!

Barnabas: Who do you mean by “we”?

This comes to a head with one of Dark Shadows‘ most famous bloopers:

Barnabas: Tell them that you saw no one here.
Wilkins: Oh, that’s fine. What am I gonna tell ’em?
Barnabas: That you saw no one here!

Jenny is being kept in a cell in the basement of the great house on the estate. Wilkins and maidservant Beth were assigned to watch her. On Friday Jenny bashed Wilkins on the head with her dinner tray, unfortunately not hard enough to kill him and get the odious Mr Davis off the show. She did knock him out, though, and ran off to the cottage to stab Quentin. We cut to the cell, where Jenny is babbling to Beth. It gradually dawns on Beth that Jenny is telling her she stabbed Quentin and killed him. Beth locks Jenny in the cell and rushes off to the cottage.

In the cottage, Barnabas has summoned wicked witch Angelique and asked her to bring Quentin back to life. Angelique points out some of the flaws in Barnabas’ plan, and tells him that even if she does grant his wish the price for her services will be very high. They seem to be approaching a tentative agreement when Beth arrives at the door and Angelique vanishes.

Beth finds Barnabas in the cottage. He tries to keep her out. It has long since been established that, as a vampire, Barnabas is far stronger than any mortal man, yet Beth pushes past him without apparent difficulty. For that matter, we also know that he is as capable as Angelique of vanishing into thin air, yet he hangs around while Beth sees Quentin’s body. Barnabas insists she tell no one what she saw in the cottage, and he is staring at her with the same intensity that has sometimes exerted an hypnotic effect on people. This doesn’t work on Beth. She says that she will tell Judith Collins, the mistress of the estate, that Quentin is dead and that Barnabas was with him. Barnabas just watches Beth go. Evidently he has given up on using his vampiric powers. Terry Crawford’s literal acting style doesn’t win her much enthusiasm from the fans of Dark Shadows, but it does add a touch of humor to a scene like this. Vampire? What’s that? Sounds like bullshit, I’m gonna report this to the boss.

We cut to the drawing room of the great house, where Quentin’s body is laid out in a coffin with candles burning on high stands by its head and foot. Barnabas and Beth are there. Beth tells Barnabas she has not yet spoken to Judith. Apparently she just took Quentin’s body to the great house on her own? And found a coffin? And carried it into the drawing room where she put Quentin in it? And that’s how the family is going to find out Quentin is dead, by seeing him lying in state in the middle of the house?

I have questions. Screenshot by Dark Shadows Before I Die.

Barnabas and Beth exit, and Angelique enters. She tells the corpse that she will raise him from the dead, and that once she does Barnabas will really be sorry.

Episode 718: Spy school

The principal writer of the first seventeen weeks of Dark Shadows was Art Wallace, who was interested in characters as one another’s reflections. Many of his episodes were structured as diptychs, in which we would alternate between two small groups dealing with similar situations. In the comparison, we would see that people who were in some ways very different from each other or hostile to each other would make the same decisions when faced with the same circumstances.

Wallace left the show in October 1966, never to return, but his interest in mirroring comes up again and again. The current storyline centers on Barnabas Collins, who has traveled back to the year 1897. In the first months of 1969, the ghost of Quentin Collins was persecuting strange and troubled boy David, and it was to rescue David that Barnabas participated in a summoning ritual which, to his surprise, got him unstuck in time and brought him face to face with the living Quentin. It also turned Barnabas back into what he was for 172 years, a vampire.

This story is the inverted image of Dark Shadows‘ first costume drama insert, which ran from November 1967 to March 1968. In that period, well-meaning governess Vicki participated in a summoning ritual because she knew that some supernatural menace posed a mortal threat to David. She did not know who that menace was or in what way he was supernatural, but the audience knew that it was Barnabas the vampire. During the four months of that uncertain and frightening journey into the past, we learned how Barnabas became a vampire and that he could be interesting even if he were not one. Vicki didn’t learn anything, and would eventually be written out of the show.

Early in today’s episode, Barnabas is in the room on top of the tower in the great house on the estate of Collinwood. This room was introduced in the 1790s story as one of the places where Barnabas was hidden. In this period, a mentally ill woman named Jenny Collins is hidden there. Governess Rachel Drummond sneaked into the room because Barnabas’ unwilling associate, ethnic stereotype Magda Rákóczi, read Rachel’s palm and told her she had a deadly enemy who was hiding there, and that if she let that enemy choose the time of their first meeting she would have no chance of survival. Jenny sprang from the room, locked Rachel in it, went to the main part of the house, and set fire to the sheets of the bed in which the stuffy Edward Collins lay sleeping.

Barnabas heard about this from Rachel, who reminds him of his lost love Josette. He knows that Angelique, the wicked witch who turned him into a vampire in the first place, is operating in this period and that she has already targeted Rachel. He knows nothing about Jenny, and so he assumes that Angelique is lurking in the tower room. When he enters it, he opens an armoire and finds a doll’s head. The rest of the doll is not attached and the back of the head is caved in, but the face is undamaged. This is the first suggestion of a mirror, a device in which a face can be seen intact and functional even though it is separated from the rest of the person.

Barnabas calls for Angelique and she appears. Barnabas denounces Angelique’s crimes; Angelique brings up his. She asks what he sees when he looks in the mirror, then remembers that he casts no reflection. Angelique does not mention what we have seen ever since we first met her during the 1790s segment, that the vampire curse made Barnabas into her reflection. Today, for example, she gleefully taunts him with the murders he has committed, including those her curse compelled him to commit. This reminds longtime viewers of #341, when Barnabas pressured his friend Julia Hoffman into helping him kill a man named Dave Woodard and then gleefully taunted her with her new status as a murderer.

Angelique tells Barnabas that he has only to love her and she will cease to be his enemy. She makes it clear that she knows all about the mission that has led him to travel back in time from 1969, and offers to help him accomplish it. She suggests that it is his hatred for her that has led her to treat him and everyone around him so cruelly for so long. She says that she will return his love as abundantly as she has returned his hate. She claims to be his mirror, as we know he has long been hers, and offers to show him a pleasing reflection if he submits to her desires.

Barnabas angrily refuses, and Angelique conjures up an image of his impending destruction in the window. Barnabas will not look into this magic mirror, and when he seizes Angelique she vanishes from his arms.

Quentin is on his guard against Barnabas. In the course of an adorable scene in which Quentin and his twelve year old nephew Jamison pretend to be spies, he sends Jamison to steal something that belongs to Barnabas.

Jamison is leery of the whole thing; he says that Quentin doesn’t know any more about real spycraft than he does, forcing Quentin to admit that he was in fact a spy for the police in Egypt not so long ago. This too will get the attention of longtime viewers. Jamison is played by David Henesy, who in the parts of Dark Shadows set in the 1960s plays David Collins. Jamison and Quentin are in the groundskeeper’s cottage on the estate, which from December 1966 to March 1967 was home to David’s mother Laura Murdoch Collins. Laura often told the story of the Phoenix, usually setting the scene in an unnamed land which, she said in #140, “Some call… Paradise.” But she leans heavily enough on the existing mythology of the Phoenix that she reminds even readers who have never heard of Herodotus of ancient Greece and Egypt. Laura herself turned out to be a supernatural phenomenon consisting of several distinct beings reflecting themselves back to each other.

Quentin decides that Jamison must sneak into Barnabas’ house and bring his cane back to the cottage. After he does so, Quentin casts a spell that causes Jamison to speak with the voice of Ba’al, a title for various gods whose cults are remembered very unfavorably in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Among other grim associations the name of Ba’al brings to the minds of those who adhere to the great monotheistic religions is the practice of child sacrifice among the Phoenicians, a practice that often involved the burning of the body of the sacrificed child. Since “Phoenician” and “Phoenix” sound so much alike,* longtime viewers may well associate Ba’al with Laura.

Quentin has made a voodoo doll of Barnabas. Through Jamison, Ba’al says that only silver will work against Barnabas. Silver is of course used in making mirrors, and the piece of silver Quentin uses to inflict disabling pain on Barnabas is the head of Barnabas’ own cane. So once more Barnabas finds himself oppressed by a reflection, or perhaps by the absence of a reflection.

Barnabas is with Magda when he collapses under the pain Quentin is causing him. They discover that the cane is missing. Magda figures out what is happening, and rushes to the cottage. She confronts Quentin, jeering at his cowardice. Quentin is no man at all. He is using a child as a pawn in a black magic rite, and fighting an enemy using a doll. Magda looks at Quentin’s face and reacts with horror as the image of a skull is superimposed on it. She recognizes this as a sign that he will die soon.

Jamison has scenes with both Quentin and Magda today. David Henesy had such great chemistry with David Selby that it’s no wonder Mr Selby named his son “Jamison,” and Hall’s equally great chemistry with him leads me to suspect that if her son Matthew hadn’t already been born when she joined the show he might have been named for Mr Henesy as well. Hall and Jonathan Frid are always wonderful together, and today’s Barnabas/ Angelique confrontation is the best scene Frid and Lara Parker have shared so far. Angelique’s maniacal intensity has always set an upper bound to how responsive Parker could be to Frid’s performance. She is calm enough today that we see them for the first time really in the same space.

*As well they might- they both come from the ancient Greek Φοίνιξ, an adjective meaning “red.” Herodotus calls the legendary fire creature “red-bird,” and the Greeks named the northern Canaanites after the red dye they bought from them.

Episode 717: I know what color a lie is

A showcase for the actors today. We begin in the room on top of the tower at the great house on the estate of Collinwood. Madwoman Jenny Collins, who has been locked up in that room for some time, is threatening to stab her sister-in-law Judith with a large pair of scissors. Judith and her brother Edward have been hiding Jenny and trying to keep the rest of the family in the dark about her presence in the house. For services to this secret, they have been paying maidservant Beth Chavez and, we heard in #707, someone named Mrs Fillmore. Beth comes in just in time to distract Jenny with talk about her “babies,” and thereby to prevent her from killing Judith. Jenny turns to some baby dolls, and cuddles them happily.

Judith goes downstairs and encounters newly hired governess Rachel Drummond. Rachel has caught on the someone is living in the tower room, and the other day sneaked up there and let Jenny out. Judith reprimands Rachel for seeing and hearing things that don’t exist. Rachel is a neurotic intellectual. Her insecurities compelled her to investigate the question of the tower room, and also make it plausible that she might eventually cave in to Judith’s attempt to gaslight her into believing that she didn’t really see what she saw.

Rachel goes out, and Beth enters. Judith shows how frustrated she is with the whole situation. This scene is a bit of a letdown. As Judith, Joan Bennett was brilliant opposite Marie Wallace’s Jenny, and brilliant again opposite Kathryn Leigh Scott’s Rachel. But she falls to pieces alone with Terrayne Crawford as Beth. So many of the fansites feature so much grousing about Miss Crawford’s literalist style of acting that I hate to pile on, but it is true that she did not give Bennett anything to play off of. When Miss Crawford delivers a line, its meaning is the dictionary meaning of the words that compose it, no more and no less. She never leaves you wondering what else is going on in Beth’s mind. Sharing a scene with her would be like sharing a scene with a sign labeled “No Right on Red.” Later, Miss Wallace will have a two-scene with Miss Crawford, but as a character in a psychotic state she doesn’t need support. Her lines in that scene are flowery gibberish that don’t work at all, but neither actress is to blame for that.

The master class in acting resumes as we cut to the Old House on the estate. The mysterious Barnabas Collins has recently arrived at Collinwood and is staying in the Old House as the guest of his distant cousins in the great house. Rachel and Barnabas are attracted to each other, and she tells him what has happened. He says that he believes her, and goes on to say that no one at Collinwood is what they seem. She pleasantly replies “Except for you!” He hesitates before agreeing.

In fact, Barnabas has more than five hundred episodes of secrets he is keeping from Rachel and everyone else. Jonathan Frid’s work prior to Dark Shadows was almost entirely on stage, but he used his face like a movie actor, keeping every part of it but his eyes virtually immobile. With that, he can isolate emotions, playing just one feeling at a time. All anyone can see by looking at him in his scenes with Rachel today is that he is anguished. Rachel interprets that anguish as a sign that he cares about her, and she is delighted to think that she has such a straightforward and reliable friend.

Returning viewers know that Barnabas is in fact the most dangerous person Rachel has ever met. That knowledge on our part frees Miss Scott to play Rachel’s relief at Barnabas’ friendliness as broadly as she likes. Her unrestrained display of good cheer brightens the episode’s otherwise somber emotional palette, but the irony the audience finds in a woman having this reaction to Barnabas keeps the dramatic tension high.

Barnabas walks Rachel back to the great house. They have made a plan that she will bring him the key to the tower room and he will go up there to investigate. She impulsively kisses him on the cheek. Rachel goes in the house and finds to her surprise that Judith is still awake. Judith detains Rachel in the drawing room with a glass of sherry and a lot of disconnected talk. Judith doesn’t make eye contact with Rachel during this scene; she doesn’t want a conversation. She is simply enjoying her new position as head of the household. Rachel cannot get away until Beth enters and Judith abruptly dismisses her.

Barnabas has been watching the windows of the tower room and has seen lights go on and off. Nervous, he considers letting himself into the room without a key; he has the means to do that, but he would like to keep Rachel from knowing about his abilities, and so he resolves to wait for her.

After Rachel brings Barnabas the key, he goes to the tower room and uses it to let himself in. No one is there. He picks up the damaged, severed head of a doll, one of Jenny’s “babies.” Suddenly, he hears someone enter. He turns, and reacts with shock.