The Ghost In the Fly Gallery

By Susan Hart

The Ghost In the Fly Gallery, is a paranormal mystery romance novel, full of spicy and romantic scenes and set in the era of Victorian London, one year after the Jack The Ripper murders.

Sarah Brown is an actress working at the famous Covent Gardens theatre which her father, Maxwell Brown, used to manage and act and direct in. He was murdered nine years before the story starts, and Sarah seeks the help of detective Colin Noyes, whose assistant is her uncle Augustus Rochester, in order to tie up some loose ends and burgeoning problems.

Woven in amongst the ghost hunting and criminal elements in Victorian London is the growing romance between strong willed & independent Sarah, upper class and handsome detective Colin; the hunt for some stolen then hidden jewels, a sleazy stage manager who’s after all of the actresses, and of course the ghost--Maxwell Brown.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Nov 9, 2015
• ISBN: 9781329679511

Susan Hart

I was born in England, but have lived in Southern California for many years. I m now retired and live in the Pacific NW in a little seaside city amongst the giant redwoods and wonderful harbor, almost at the Oregon border. My husband and I have one cat, called Midnight and she is featured in two of my latest Sci-Fi short stories. I love Science Fiction, animals, and trying to help others. I publish under Doreen Milstead as well as my own name. My photo was taken right before the coronation of QE II in the UK.

Book preview

The Ghost In the Fly Gallery

The Ghost In the Fly Gallery

By

Susan Hart

Copyright 2015 Susan Hart

Synopsis: The Ghost In the Fly Gallery, is a paranormal mystery romance novel, full of spicy and romantic scenes and set in the era of Victorian London, one year after the Jack The Ripper murders. 

Sarah Brown is an actress working at the famous Covent Gardens theatre which her father, Maxwell Brown, used to manage and act and direct in. He was murdered nine years before the story starts, and Sarah seeks the help of detective Colin Noyes, whose assistant is her uncle Augustus Rochester, in order to tie up some loose ends and burgeoning problems. 

Woven in amongst the ghost hunting and criminal elements in Victorian London is the growing romance between strong willed & independent Sarah, upper class and handsome detective Colin; the hunt for some stolen then hidden jewels, a sleazy stage manager who’s after all of the actresses, and of course the ghost--Maxwell Brown. 

Chapter One

London, Covent Gardens Theater, August 1889.

Much excitement filled the air. Of course, it paled before Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee earlier the previous year, but this new play set a mood for high entertainment unrivaled by the other London theaters.

Tonight, the throng of playgoers scuttled forward by the hundreds. People cued in the six lines waiting anxious to see latest theater sensation, Romancing the Stage, with rising star actress Sarah Brown playing the lead.

Twenty-two year old Sarah Brown had burst onto the stage at the tender age of eighteen--at a lesser-known theater. Now, she too wanted to meet her great expectations and rise to marry a better, just like the fictional Jane Eyre.

Now, Sarah wanted to wow them at her father’s former theater--the Royal Covent Gardens Theater. Sarah’s heartfelt voice and soulful, big, blue eyes always wowed critics and supporters. ‘She's going to bring back the glory days of Covent Gardens’, they published in their theater reviews; ‘She'll sell more ticket than her deceased father, God rest his soul, ever dreamed of’, wrote another critic.

‘This show is going to be bigger than The Irish Heiress and Woman’, penned a third theater pundit.

In the large crowd outside of the theater, a fashionable Victorian woman who wore a profusion of puffy yellow roses on her wide brimmed black hat, which was perched over her bright red, curly hair, sighed deeply as if a great psychological weight had been lifted from her feminine shoulders.

Jack the Ripper stopped killing prostitutes in East London one year ago today.

The people standing in line around her, nodded appreciatively at the somewhat good news.

Bless those fallen dames' soul, said another lady in her forties, her own green and blue boater hat secure on her head, and matching her skirt and white blouse.

She checked inside her sequined green purse, in effect passing the conversational baton to someone else. Everyone was dressed in his or her best on opening night at the theater and while you could see her wide black belt, her black granny boots were hid under the hem of her long skirt.

To add to the elegance, she wore spats of a matching shade because everyone did. Shoe spats not only kept the mud off ladies’ shoes, but also, they were the latest fashion rage.

No one deserved to die like that, said an elderly lady as her lace-covered hand rummaged for her theater tickets in her ruffled purse, which hung from her left wrist.

Standing next to her, a woman in her late twenties adjusted her black shawl on her shoulders. They were my age, you know.

A gentleman sans beard and mustache remarked, Lots of sleuths, both professional and amateur, are still baffled by that case.

One very young lady of twenty remarked, I heard they pulled Colin Noyes off the Ripper case recently.

Married couples moved forward together en masse as if in a choreographed ballet dance. One husband remarked to the young lady He's a smart chap, and the gentleman with the ambassador's beard tipped his black top hat to a passerby. He'd solve that case.

Commissioner Warren is doing his best, said a tall man in a black waistcoat and bright green vest and black trousers. He's a bureaucrat though and they don't think creatively like those criminals and that Noyes fellow.

Chomping at the bit, a tall man and stout with it, remarked Don't get it all wrong. Colin Noyes is a private detective. He’s not hired and fired by the Metropolitan Police Department. He works his own cases.

A spirited lady dressed in a green blouse and blue-bustled skirt and brown granny boots huffed in defiance. Neil Cream, that convicted murderer, already confessed to the ghastly crimes anyway during his hanging. So, it's done with!

I still say Nathan Ksaminsky did it... muttered an older gentleman, fingering his thick, white, debonair mustache.

What--the man gone insane from syphilis in the asylum? He'd have confessed to killing anyone, even Maxwell Brown, said the lady pointing to the theater.

Was it true, what they said? asked the first lady who had started all the morbid talk, while the crowd tried to turn their minds to other things in order to relax and be entertained. He was murdered nine years ago on the London Bridge.

"Yes, madam. His body was found in the water under the third stone arch. I believe it was his murder that set the whole thing in motion. London’s been a frightening place ever since Maxwell's murder.

Now you have all those immigrants, and along with them their anger, frustration, and the poor over in Whitechapel as well all piling on top of one another. Sleeping tied standing up in them common houses for four or eight pence a night, they are.

They never caught the former theater director's murderer either, one of the women said softly.

To think--the former theater director's young daughter almost ended up in Whitechapel after her father’s death--theater out of funds and all.

Goodness! A woman threw her hand over her mouth. She might have been butchered like those Ripper dames.

One man tapped his walking stick, grabbing the street but almost falling over because the tip got stuck in between two cobblestones.

Aye, she's twenty-two. She might have been one of those Ripper ladies. He nodded.

Sarah Brown is no Get-and-Give girl! exclaimed a society woman rather loudly, holding her pink and white-lined umbrella and wearing a stack of jewels around her neck that glittered above her emerald-green blouse which had been tucked into her brown skirt.

Everyone’s awareness turned to the square and to the noise of hissing, sputtering gaslights beginning to turn on outside the theater as night fell.

The man quickly apologized. I didn't mean that...just that she’s...

She’s an upper middle class, good-looking woman, Sarah is, but if her Grandmother hadn’t come back for her--she might have ended up in East London for sure.

Well, Sarah Brown is a fighter. She's brilliant. She's going to be better than that...than that...Petra Romanov.

Petra Romanov, the Russian Dancer, added a man with a French accent, to help those of his associates who hadn’t a clue about Russian dancers.

She'll be the star of the stage, Sarah Brown, she will...you should all just watch and see when she makes her debut tonight, concluded the lady in the long, pale yellow dress.

They quieted down as the line began moving again. London's well to do, nearer-to-do and the wanting-to-do betters in great need for release and relaxation--shoving the entire Ripper thing behind their ears.

However, even their refuge of entertainment on the theater's grand stage sometimes failed them. The theater had burnt down twice over the past two centuries. Some whispered that the theater had also acquired a ghost recently.

Some now said this ghost was none other than the beloved Maxwell Brown, found dead, after being tossed off the London Bridge nine years before. Whatever the case may be, people turned out in the thousands for the debut of the former theater director's daughter, the lovely and talented Ms. Sarah Brown.

TONIGHT, INSIDE EACH of its six doorways into the theater’s rich interior, a female ticket taker--her hair coiffured in a fashionable updo--smiled and then snapped up the patron's money and issued ticket seats in return, and all at an amazing pace.

Everything about the theater confirmed how grand and thankful one should be for being alive and for an opportunity to see the best of the best. Electricity brought the area surrounding the theater into the modern era with improved light and ventilation.

On the portico, Covent Gardens’ six beige Tuscan columns towered over each doorway. Both bases and tops of the columns had been decorated in an art nouveau floral design. Vomitory aisle entrances covered in thick, red carpet led to two thousand plush theater seats.

Surely, out of the mouths of Ancient Romans, in their togas and sandals, the highest expressions of praise and exaltations for Covent Garden would be uttered after entering--and the London theater goers too, dressed in their fashionable best. Women wore their colorful bustled skirts of black and grey along with white blouses.

Stylish hats or bonnets perched or were tied on their dainty heads. Tiny ruffled matching purses encircling their wrist. Corsets under their bustle skirts pulled their waist in so as to bely their age.

Apple blushes adorned the cheeks of young ladies of marriageable age. Young, satisfied women who attended the theater, hooked their hand on the inside elbow of their beaus as they promenaded to see the play, Romancing the Stage.

Or, they attended escorted by their best girlfriend or parents. What better ritual ladder to weave for climbing into a more satisfying relationship than Covent Gardens Theater on Bow Street? Of course, successful men attended theater all the time as well.

Even bachelor and cat lover, once high-diving expert and a man who lived in a flat down by the Thames waterfront in Newington--Private Detective Colin Noyes--occasionally visited Covent Gardens for a little relaxation and diversion.

Men wore black waistcoats and tails, colorful single or double-buttoned vests and stern expressions of repute. Some twirled and pounded their gold and silver-tipped canes as they walked.

They pointedly noticed friends and acquaintances and chatted about social or business matters.

The men's black top hats were swept off their heads every now and then in order to acknowledge a gracious lady or gentleman, who replied by a ricocheted grin or smile, as if programmed to do so by their social upbringing or an etiquette teacher.

INSIDE, BACKSTAGE IN her dressing room, Sarah Brown twiddled nervously with her father’s locket. The locket opened up and played a little tune not many people knew: Schubert's Symphony No. 8, ‘The Unfinished’ which seemed appropriate as unfinished business remained between her and the theater management.

She should be the owner.

Now, the new manager Dick Smitheen, threatened to sack her and Sarah didn't know why. Supporters and even the few would-be-always-critical critics loved her. All she knew was that it related to the mysterious death of her father.

Ever since he died, leaving the theater in shambles financially and her so poor she had to buy hand-me-down clothes during her early teen years, Sarah vowed to repurchase the glorious old theater.

She refused to believe rumors of a ghost haunting the place--her place. She refused to believe predictions that Covent Gardens Theater would go down in fire like the last two previous times---and be rebuilt on crumbled ashes and dashed hopes and dreams. She applied more makeup, dabbing it on her face furiously.

Tonight, she'd show Dick Smitheen. She pushed her chin up using her fingers, wrapped around the locket, You're a star Sarah Brown. A Star! Just look at yourself.

Portly and balding, five foot eight inch Dick Smitheen suddenly invaded the room dressed in his black suit and with a gold pocket watch chain dangling from his pants. One hundred and nineteen pounds, five foot five inch tall Sarah willed herself to stay perfectly motionless.

Her petite, top-heavy body frame gave her a siren's appeal and she did her best not to inflame his aggressive libido and manner towards her.

Tonight, she wore a black bustle skirt and pink blouse with ruffles around the neckline. Sarah kept brushing her straight, shoulder-length black hair. Her long languid brush strokes lingered like soft incense gliding through the air.

She gazed helplessly into her mirror like a young girl dreaming about her beau coming to rescue her from a dull life of drudgery. It began. Her spontaneous, gorgeous, seductive blue eyes caught Dick Smitheen's skeptical, lecherous hazel eyes--flashing angrily at her already.

He paused five feet from her vanity chair. What are you doing, Sarah? It's almost curtain time.

Your pocket watch must be slow, Dick. Sarah stared at him furiously from her mirror, but didn't turn around. She hated when he interrupted her reverie.

Had she ever missed a curtain call? No.

Had she ever disappointed Dick in the dress rehearsals? No.

Her young, blue eyes bore a new look of determination to stand up for herself. She was going to make a lot of money and win back the theater from Dick--even if the slimy stage manager and almost-owner didn't like it one bit.

She destined herself to accomplish this goal. Sarah Brown felt it deep in her gut and she didn't care if it was a dog-eat-dog world. She'd win in the end.

Dick Smitheen instinctively stood in her way. His always-skeptical attitude towards her was deliberate. It had nothing to do with the fact he now almost-owned the theater. Dick began tearing down her confidence once again, which was his nature.

"You know I want you standing in the wings--waiting with bated breath for the curtain to rise, fifteen minutes ahead of time. You need every moment to think about what you're going to do on stage so you don't miss your lines or cues.

"Don’t sit back here and fantasize about the past, your boyfriend, or how your father once owned this theater. Scotland Yard concluded your father attached himself to bad, criminal characters.

That's what killed him. That's why Maxwell lost all the money to the theater. It's done! Get over it Sarah Brown or you're not going to last in this business. I hired you because of your talent--talent in that flighty yet pretty brain of yours. Now, don't blow this opportunity for me, the troupe, or the theater.

Sarah slammed her ivory-handled hairbrush down on her vanity. My father's got nothing to do with this. I know if you were I, you'd be out there waiting. But you're not me. And that's way too long to be standing on my feet.

Sarah turned around and flashed her own darts into his jittery, hazel eyes.

It's my job to help everyone look and be their best. Even if we don't get along for some reason occasionally, Miss Brown. He took a step closer and towered over her.

Sarah stood up. I'm the one out on that stage. It isn't you, Dick Smitheen. You're not out there acting any more. We are. She sat down and gathered her things up on her vanity table.

He sneered and smoothed his hands over his balding head.