Short Story Review: "Eveline's Visitant" is a short ghost story about two cousins who engage in a duel over a nameless woman, which ends in the death of one (André) and a curse on the other (Hector). Even though Hector is instantly remorseful, this is a tale of Gothic horror. If the curse seems unfair, too bad, equity is not be a requisite element of curses. André was a ladies' man, a "favourite of women," who treacherously stole a woman away from his cousin. In revenge, André's ghost seduces Hector's (later) wife, just as he seduced women when alive. At first glance it seems wrong the sweet and much-loved Eveline should suffer for her husband's youthful crime. So often it's the innocent who suffer most and most unfairly. But was she guiltless in her relationship with the ghost? The reader can't help but wonder why Eveline suffers so much trauma that she wastes away and dies. Braddon leaves a suggestion that Eveline entered into some form of supernatural infidelity, in which case she is punished sure enough for her wavering loyalty. There are even intimations of some erotic attachment between the ghost of Andre and Eveline. She confesses that the ghost "plucked all old familiar joys out of my heart, and left in it but one weird, unholy pleasure -- the delight of his presence ... I have striven against this wickedness in vain." Ironically, she asks her husband to curse her for this sin. "Eveline's Visitant" is a tale of the other side of this life, where the world is harsh, evil happens, and mortals suffer. Mary Elizabeth Braddon was famous for writing "sensation novels," her best known being Lady Audley's Secret (1862). [3★]
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