Angelique 11 Date: 12/17/01 2:05:26 PM Central Standard Time From: Aesgaard Angelique didn't remember being carried on to the Californian half alive. When she woke up in a New York hospital, the doctors told her she had frostbite throughout her arms and legs, but something else prevented her from the humiliation of amputation. Her recovery was nothing short of a miracle as Hilda heard about the ship's sinking and came to New York with Zelda and Samantha in tow. Having lost everything in the sinking, Angelique used the reparations from the White Star Line to furnish herself with a basement apartment in Greenwich Village from out of which she sold good luck charms, fertility tokens and even a few fortunes. Basically happy for the time, she was just barely scraping under this role. She had a home, enough to eat and her dreams. She wondered if Willie Loomis had even been born yet as she thought of Barnabus up in the mausoleum waiting for the future to catch up with him. Eventually, Angelique found she needed to make more money and she reluctantly started working behind the scenes in the theatre district as a seamstress and assistant. A director noticed her legs one day and made her a dancer. From there, she became an actress performing behind the vaudeville stars of the day and gradually getting the serious roles. A hesitant role in the play "Dracula" took her across the country several times over, but in 1925, many of her co-stars started to notice she hadn't aged a day in over ten years. Questions about her age and beauty secrets forced her to leave the troupe near Fall River, Massachusetts. Instead of returning to New York, and with different plans in store, Angelique headed north under a brief new alias. Carrying ten suitcases of possessions, she took the train up the coast seeking to hide in anonymity. It was a small town on the coast she finally stopped at. She checked into the local hotel and without seeing her room traveled to the largest house in town. She smiled wickedly as the horse-drawn carriage delivered her to the mansion of the wealthiest family in town. Pausing at the door, she reflected nostalgically at the surroundings as she finally forced herself to rap on the door. "Yes, mum ?" A maid appeared in traditional black and white. "Is the master of the house at home ?" Angelique asked. "Yes, mum, he is." the maid answered. "Who may I ask is calling ?" "Please tell Jamison Collins it is his cousin, Angelique Collins, from England."
