Daphne Vane has never confronted a man pointing a gun at her before now. Then again, she just found out she’s one-quarter hell cat, not something that happens every day, either. Those two unprecedented events have an unprecedented outcome for Daphne in “Darkness,” chapter 18 of To Ride the Lightning Bolt, my weekly serial about a young American woman whose life has taken a turn to the bizarre. If you’ve not been reading it before, you can start here.

It’s become a “thing” for some writers to suggest a playlist of songs the reader of their book might listen to as an accompaniment. Usually, the list is dominated by recent releases. Well, the song I’d pair with this chapter is one about emotional depression, a song originally released in 1969 by the Youngbloods, “Darkness, Darkness.” None of the many versions I’ve found exactly match how I think this song should be done, but the version that works best for me (so far) is the one done in 2003 by Lisa Torban, which oddly enough originated as part of the soundtrack for a documentary about the Titanic.

Detail of “Ophelia,” painted by Pre-Raphaelite artist John Everett Millais (1829 – 1896), modeled in 1852 by Elizabeth Siddel (1829 – 1862), who would also model for many paintings by her eventual husband, Dante Gabriel Rossetti.