(Written by Geoffrey Hamell, first published in "The Eagle Hill Sentinel", Issue 2, October, 1985.)
Angelique Stokes, named after the original Angelique who married Ben Stokes in the late 18th century, came from an unusual family. Her father, Timothy, was a dabbler in science, satanism and liquor; her Aunt Hannah fancied herself an expert on the occult. It was, perhaps, not surprising that Angelique became a witch - though, in view of the way she bickered with her father, aunt, and sister Alexis, it seems almost strange that she didn't kill them all. Instead, she got away from them by marrying Quentin Collins, the young heir to Collinwood. With a loving husband, a rich family, and later a son, Daniel, it seemed that she had all she could possibly want.
But her unhappy upbringing had left Angelique with an insatiable greed for affection, attention - and power. Not content with manipulating Quentin, she seduced nearly every man who came within reach - Will Loomis, Dr. Cyrus Longworth, Damion Edwards, and composer Bruno Hess (who immortalized their affair, and enraged Quentin, with his "Ode to Angelique"). She also encouraged - but apparently never indulged - the fantasies of Quentin's brother Roger, and even of housekeeper Julia Hoffman, whose fanatical devotion made her a useful slave. Damion, however, proved too strong-willed to be properly controlled; so, in 1969, Angelique coolly had him shot by Bruno, who then walled him up on Collinwood's cellar with the aid of Trask, the butler. (Another of Angelique's lovers?)
Not surprisingly, Angelique was thoroughly hated by the few adults at Collinwood not under her spell - Elizabeth, Carolyn Loomis, and Chris Collins - and, ultimately, by most of those who were living there. When a seance was held to try to contact Damion, Roger - mad with jealous frustration at being the only man she wouldn't take to bed - took advantage of the darkness to drive a jeweled hatpin into her throat, killing her instantly. Though thrown into turmoil by the crime, the family did not go to great lengths to identify the murderer. Quentin, indeed, was so eager to forget his faithless wife that he married Maggie Evans within a year.
But one person who refused to forget Angelique was her father, Timothy Stokes. Though they seldom had a kind word to say to each other, Stokes' love for his favorite daughter was obsessive to the point of mania. (Her twin, Alexis, he seems to have barely noticed. Odd man.) Combining his weird scientific theories with his knowledge of the occult, he devised a bizarre experiment to restore Angelique to life. "Purchasing" the mysterious Roxanne Drew from her warlock lover Claude North, he drained most of the life-force from her body with his machines and, through mystic incantations, transferred it into Angelique's undecayed body as she lay in her coffin. As fate would have it, the coffin had just been opened by by Quentin and Alexis, checking to see if Angelique had already returned. Alone with her sister's corpse, Alexis was horrified to see her arise from the coffin! Feeling weak and cold - because the comatose Roxanne still shared her life-force - Angelique ruthlessly drained all the energy from her twin, leaving Alexis' body in place of her own.
Posing as Alexis, Angelique returned to Collinwood, determined to find out who had killed her and make him pay. A frightened Aunt Hannah soon learned her true identity, and was easily intimidated into giving whatever help she could; Hoffman, overjoyed to have her back, served her willingly. The restless spirit of Damon was not pleased by her return, and wanted revenge - but Angelique's power was greater, and she easily exorcised him. Seeking to win Quentin back as Alexis, she cast a love spell on him, and stopped him from killing himself in despair over Maggie's estrangement. Exploiting the couple's problems, Angelique subjected Maggie to a series of "hauntings" and vicious manipulations aimed at destroying her marriage, ultimately driving her to a thwarted attempt at suicide. Failing in that, she encouraged the demonic John Yaeger in Maggie's kidnapping!
For all her powers, Angelique still felt her life-force periodically draining away, and had to replenish it by absorbing the life of others - lawyer Larry Chase, a handyman named Fred, and an unnamed stranger. At last, faced with Barnabas Collins' open opposition to her schemes, she was forced to ask her father for help, and he revealed that he was responsible for her resurrection. He also - by partially recalling her life-force - demonstrated what would happen if his daughter continued to neglect him.
Suddenly Angelique's plans were changed by a startling discovery - that the late Cyrus Longworth had believed that Quentin was her murderer. This did not reduce her hatred of Maggie, whom she began controlling directly with her magic, making Maggie act as if she were a witch. But now she wanted Quentin destroyed as well. When Bruno angered her, she used witchcraft to kill him, maneuvered Quentin into looking like his attacker, and planted "evidence" to convince Quentin that Maggie had cast the spell. Persuading him to break jail, she hid Quentin in the unused part of Collinwood, plotting her final revenge.
In this seeming moment of triumph, Angelique began eliminating her enemies. She cornered Will Loomis, Barnabas' ally, and drove him to a fatal leap from the tower. Shocked to discover that the Julia of Barnabas' world was impersonating her trusted Hoffman, she imprisoned her in a secret cellar room. Even more unsettling, she learned that Roger, now totally deranged, was actually her murderer. Revealing her identity to him, she finally gave him the embrace he had so desired - and stole the life from his body.
She needed that energy, desperately - for Barnabas had rescued Roxanne from her father, and the girl was slowly beginning to revive. Knowing that if Roxanne recovered it would end her stolen life, Angelique hypnotized Maggie and sent her to Quentin's hiding place, with orders to shoot him on sight. But just as they came face to face, Roxanne spoke - and Angelique died once more, breaking the spell and finally ending her reign of terror.
