Summary
A crumbling New-England manse, all oak-panelled arteries and gaslight ghosts, swallows a child-bride whole. Courtney—veiled in chiffon and trepidation—crosses the threshold beside Richard Vaughan, heir to a bloodline that has pickled itself in test-tubes and guilt. The honeymoon candle gutters: Richard’s alembics bubble louder than any whispered endearment, while Nanny, a calcified relic of wet-nurse tyranny, patrols the corridors like a gothic gargoyle. Starved for touch, Courtney drifts into the orbit of Basil Gallatin, a visiting chemist whose cologne of benzene and danger ignites dormant synapses. One thunder-laden afternoon a shrieking burglar alarm maroons the pair in the laboratory’s crimson half-light; what begins as solace mutates into combustion—lips brushed, breath mingled, retinas dilated. Nanny stumbles upon the tableau, cataleptic with righteous spite; when Richard returns she spews testimony sharp as ground glass. Gallatin bolts, divorce papers flutter like albino moths, yet remorse ricochets: Richard recognizes the emotional vacuum he engineered. Gallatin, lured back by newspaper ink, offers a suicidal pact; Courtney begs her husband to turn the volatile salts on them both. Richard levels a vial of nitroglycerine-shame, scaring off the rival, but Courtney stands unflinching amid the cordite haze. In the final ember of twilight the Vaughans remain alone with the smell of burnt gun-cotton and the possibility that desire, once atomized, can recombine into something sturdier than lust.
Synopsis
After their wedding, Richard Vaughan and his wife Courtney take up residence in Richard's ancestral home. Courtney, despised by Nanny, the old housekeeper, and neglected by her husband, who buries himself in his chemical experiments, leads a lonely life. Consequently, when experimental chemist Basil Gallatin pays a lengthy visit to the Vaughan home, Courtney finds herself attracted to him. One day, during Richard's absence, a burglar alarm places Courtney and Gallatin in a compromising situation. Witnessing their embrace, Nanny is struck speechless, but when Richard returns she recovers her speech and gives damning evidence against Courtney. Gallatin flees, and Richard, realizing his culpability, gives his wife a divorce. Having read of the divorce, Gallatin returns and Courtney admonishes Richard to kill them both. Richard frightens Gallatin away with the threat of exploding one of his compounds, but Courtney defies death and remains. A reconciliation between husband and wife then follows.
