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charleygirlTitle: The Garish Light of Day 43/?
Author: charleygirl
Word Count: 3832
Rating: G
Genre: General, Drama
Characters Involved: Erik the Phantom, Christine Daae, Madame Giry
Disclaimer: The Phantom of the Opera is the creation of Gaston Leroux but probably these days copyright to Andrew Lloyd Webber.
Summary: Resurfacing...
WHY’S EVERYTHING SO HAZY?
It was a feeling Erik knew well, this sense of dislocation.
Through the fog that filled his brain some coherent part of him knew he could not be dead; there was too much pain, a sensation that had always kept him tied to the world he had so often longed to leave, pleading with a God in which he did not really believe to end his suffering. So many times in the past he had struggled through the haze to return to a cold reality which saw him curled into a ball on the dirty straw of his cage, having tried instinctively while consciousness crept upon him to protect himself from the prods and kicks aimed in his direction.
“Wake up, you filthy animal! No one pays to watch you sleep!”
If he failed to respond, a rude awakening would come upon him in the form of an ice-cold bucket of rainwater, poured over his head to the jeers and simian laughter of Grigore and his cohorts. Even at the tender age of fourteen the boy had been proving himself to be as thoroughly unpleasant as his father. He and his friends would point and mock as Erik struggled to get up, limbs weak and back on fire from the beating he had endured just a few hours before. In the depths of winter they would leave him to shiver, soaked to the bone, until one of the women, anxious to preserve Dumitru’s prize attraction, would shove a blanket and perhaps a cup of some foul-tasting broth through the bars. It was little enough, but in the face of daily torment Erik had found himself almost pathetically grateful for their concern.
So strange... how could he stay here in this warm cocoon of darkness? He had been beaten again, he knew that much, but where were the taunts and catcalls he always remembered? Why was there no one trying to drag him from the comforting arms of Morpheus just so that they could laugh and spit in his face and call him scum? Perhaps they were waiting, trying to lull him into a false sense of security, just so that they could rain down some worse indignity upon his head...
He listened, but could hear nothing but his heartbeat, loud in his ears. An attempt to open his eyes proved so terribly painful that he abandoned it almost immediately; even the tiniest movement sent daggers of fire through his skull. Somewhere, in the dim recesses of his mind, he recalled being hit, could feel the blow smashing him across the back of the head. But Dumitru never hit from behind unless he was using the whip; he liked to aim for Erik’s face, as though he wanted to enhance the horror with which his captive had already been blessed.
Gradually the fog began to lift, and the pain became, if possible, ten times worse. It seemed that there was not a part of him that did not ache or burn; coming back to himself he took an involuntary deep breath and thought that he might faint again from the agony it created. He choked, unable to draw in enough air, and each cough increased the pain to such an extent that it seemed his chest was about to rip asunder. His head throbbed, blurring the vision in the eye he had managed to force open even further. Panicking, he flailed uselessly at empty air until his hand found the solid flesh of another person; clutching at them desperately, past caring if they were friend or foe, he held on tight, convinced now that he was about to breathe his last.
“Shh... Erik, calm down, it’s all right. It’s all right, it’s only me!”
That voice! He knew that voice, so sweet and musical even when it was not raised in song. Erik tried his best to bring his coughing under control but each shallow breath he tried to take just made the fit worse. He groaned, tears of pain gathering in the corners of his eyes as the fire in his chest burned deeper and deeper with each inhalation. There was a hand, a gentle hand, on his cheek, his deformed cheek, stroking it tenderly as another lifted him with careful movements, propping him against something warm and soft until he could finally catch his breath. He lay there, exhausted, gasping like a landed fish as his body shuddered from the effort. So much energy should not need to be expended upon something as simple and mundane as breathing in and out.
“There, there,” the voice said, close to his ear, and he realised with a little embarrassment that his head was resting on someone’s shoulder. Light fingers carded through his hair. “Better now?” He tried to nod, but it was barely a twitch. Whoever it was giving him comfort seemed to understand, for they shifted slightly, raising his head higher. An arm snaked around him, a hand resting on his waist. “Your ribs are bruised, but the doctor says they will heal. Would you like some water?”
Erik opened his mouth to ask who she was, where he was and what had happened, but all that emerged was a croak. Before he could try to speak again a glass was held to his lips and his saviour was encouraging him to drink; he took a sip, and then another, water trickling into his parched mouth. He coughed a little and the glass was withdrawn; careful hands laid him back onto what he realised were soft pillows, bundled together so that he did not have to lie flat. Almost at the same moment he became aware that he was not lying amongst filthy, scratchy straw but on a well-stuffed mattress beneath light blankets. The girl – from the timbre of her voice she could not be much more than a girl – was French, not Romany. Could it be possible that the cage and the fair were nothing more than a nightmare, an illusion conjured from the hellish pits of his own mind?
Her hand was stroking his hair again, just as he had always dreamed his mother might do. A sigh escaped him for the sensation was calming, soothing the thundering in his skull for a few moments. Erik found himself relaxing into that wonderful touch, and he drifted off again, finally feeling safe.
________________________________________
When he woke once more he had no idea how much time had passed.
The mist which shrouded his thoughts thankfully seemed to have receded, but the pain was making itself felt now with a vengeance. It took a supreme effort to open his eyes – or rather eye, as for some reason the right one refused to crack more than a slit through which it was impossible to see anything. It took a couple of blinks to clear the vision in the left, but once it had Erik was able to make out his surroundings. Beyond him the room was extravagantly-decorated, all pink frills and gilded cherubs as though someone had reached into the past and dragged Marie Antoinette’s boudoir to modern Paris; he felt quite nauseous at the sight and wondered where the hell he was. The bed in which he lay was a huge four-poster affair, the mattress wide enough to comfortably accommodate at least three people the size of La Carlotta and the satin counterpane decorated with embroidered birds and flowers. There was a bucolic scene of shepherdesses painted on the footboard which brought to mind The Dance of the Country Nymphs from Il Muto; not a particularly welcome thought.
An irritating flash of white hovered above his left eye, right on the edge of his vision, and he lifted a hand that trembled infuriatingly to push it away; his fingers encountered a thick bandage, and further investigation revealed that his head was almost entirely covered in the stuff. Beneath a nightshirt that was definitely not his own lay more bandages; an experimental inhalation confirmed the damage to his ribs. Not broken, he decided with some relief, but certainly seriously bruised, maybe even cracked. He tried to lift his head, and fell back with a hiss of pain; that was evidently the site of the worst injury.
After a few moments of lying perfectly still and breathing carefully so as not to irritate his ribs he tried turning on the pillow, moving slowly and steeling himself for the agony that was sure to follow. The world tilted and spun madly and he had to wait, gritting his teeth, until it righted itself again and he could see the armchair that had been drawn up beside the bed and its sleeping occupant. Under a patchwork blanket, a snoozing Bruno on her lap, was Christine.
She looked tired; her beautiful face was white and drawn, the usually lustrous chocolate brown curls that surrounded it tangled and frizzed. A dark shadow hung from her closed left eye, the only one he could see from the angle at which her head rested against the cushions of the chair. With a combined pang of gratitude and guilt Erik realised that it was her voice he had been hearing, it was she who had held him and comforted him and in his addled state of mind he had not recognised her. Instinctively he reached out to hold her, to reassure her, but he was too weak to even sit up unaided. Thirsty and unable to resist the lure of the half full glass of water on the bedside table he tried to grasp it; it just evaded his fingers and the movement pulled on his abused ribs, drawing from him an involuntary moan which startled Christine from her uneasy slumber. Jumping from the chair and almost tipping the bewildered spaniel onto the floor, she was at his side in an instant, hovering over him with concern writ large in her big dark eyes.
“Erik?” she said hesitantly, and he frowned, an expression he instantly regretted for the discomfort it produced was exquisite. Christine lifted a finger to touch his cheek. “Erik, do you... do you know me?”
“How could I not?” he rasped, and her features lit up with relief. “My apologies, my dear, for causing you so much distress.”
“Oh, Erik..!” With a cry of joy she sat down on the bed, taking his hand in hers; he was sure that had she not been mindful of his injuries she would have flung herself into his arms. She bent her head and pressed her lips to his, and he could taste the salt of her tears as they ran down her face. Erik forced himself to lift his hand and wipe them away before they trickled down her chin and onto her rumpled dress.
“Don’t cry, Christine,” he whispered. “I’ll live.”
She shook her head. “I’m happy,” she told him, “and glad that you’re all right. I know you will be all right, now. I was so worried - ” With a little hiccup she turned away, brushing at her eyes with the back of her free hand. The diamond of her engagement ring sparkled in the lamplight.
Concerned himself now, Erik squeezed her fingers. “Christine?”
Her lip quivered. “Erik, you’ve been unconscious for three days. The doctor said that the longer it took you to wake up the greater chance there would be of permanent damage...” Her voice cracked and the tears began anew.
“Oh, Christine. Mon ange, come here...” He sighed and raised his arm, and she curled up on the bed beside him, almost desperate for his embrace. Bruno, unable to contain himself any longer and obviously resentful of being denied their attention, barked and leapt up onto the counterpane, settling down on Erik’s other side, his head on the Phantom’s leg. They both watched the dog in amusement, and Erik stroked his curly head. Bruno’s coat was neatly trimmed, his hair brushed and shining as though he had recently been given a good bath. “Someone has clearly been looked after in my absence,” Erik remarked.
Christine giggled. “Oh, that was Teddy. She said he needed tidying up.”
“Teddy? Teddy Merriman?” he asked in surprise. “What has she to do with it?”
“This is her house. Well, the house she’s renting,” Christine added. “She’s been wonderful, Erik; I don’t know what I would have done without her.” She explained how Mademoiselle Merriman and Monsieur Patterson-Smythe had found him and brought him home. Erik dimly remembered someone talking to him as he lay in the street and realised that it must have been Theodora. “I have no idea how we will manage to thank her; she has even taken over Gilda for me.”
Startled, Erik raised his head to look at her, forgetting the pain for a moment. He hissed as it stabbed at him behind the eyes. Anxiously Christine felt his forehead as best she could through the bandages, little fingers lightly stroking his distorted cheek.
“Oh, my poor dear, you must be so uncomfortable. Would you like something for the pain?”
Usually Erik did not like to take opiates or painkillers but if it was this agonising just to shift his head he would have to give in and accept whatever assistance was offered. Christine got up and emptied a packet that had doubtless been left by whatever medical practitioner had been called to the house, stirring it into the glass of water and supporting his head with infinite care to allow him to drink. When she had set him back down and he no longer felt as though he were whirling on a merry-go-round, he demanded,
“Why the devil should Theodora Merriman have to sing Gilda for you?”
“Because I have been here, of course. I cannot be in two places at once,” she told him as though he were absurdly obtuse for asking the question. “The managers have extended Rigoletto’s run now that the new production will be delayed; Teddy offered to take my place as she has played Gilda in New York and in London.”
“We have understudies for such eventualities.”
“I know, but as you gave the role of Maddalena to Sophie Leclerc in place of Augustine there is no one else. Marie cannot manage it and Monsieur Reyer would not hear of altering the score for one of the altos - ”
“Quite right too,” Erik muttered. “Whoever heard of such a thing?”
“Well, then, someone was needed in the part and as Teddy says, the show must go on,” said Christine, straightening the sheets.
“Anyone with any sense at all would put Mademoiselle Leclerc in as Gilda and move Marie Durant to Maddalena; the part is written for a mezzo after all. The whole opera will be turned upside down! Why not ruin it completely and have the men play the female roles?” Despite the pounding in his head Erik tried to sit up. His arms wobbled and shook as he struggled to support himself on his elbows and Christine had to catch him before he collapsed again. He fought against her; Bruno yapped in alarm as he was almost tipped off the bed. “Get me some paper; I’ll write instructions for Reyer. He needs to alter the casting at once and pull everyone in for extra rehearsal.”
“There isn’t time! Erik, calm down, please, it’s not important - ”
“Of course it’s important!” he shouted. “Our triumph will descend into farce if I don’t do something!”
“Erik, please, my darling, you’ll only injure yourself further,” Christine said, easing him back down onto the mattress. “You need to rest.”
Reluctantly, he gave in, allowing her to settle him amongst the pillows. She pulled the covers up to his chin, tucking him in as though he were a child. Suddenly weary, Erik couldn’t find the strength to argue. His eyelids drooped and as Christine began to hum a lullaby he welcomed sleep as it pulled him under once more.
________________________________________
“Does he remember anything about the attack?”
A new voice drew Erik back towards the waking world. His thoughts moved sluggishly; it took several moments for him to recognise its owner as Madame Giry. She was speaking softly, her tone a far cry from its usual authoritative self. Still dreadfully tired, Erik found that he was quite content to just lay there and listen; it was too much effort to even try and open his eyes.
“I haven’t asked him and he has said nothing so far.” That was Christine. He could feel her fingers laced through his own, her skin warm and smooth. “I don’t want to confuse him, not while he’s still so weak.”
“Mademoiselle Merriman has been offering to give a statement to the police if Erik wishes to report the incident.”
“I know, but I don’t think he will, Madame.”
“Oh?” Erik could almost see Antoinette lifting an eyebrow. “What makes you say that?”
There was a pause, as though Christine was gathering her thoughts, and then she said, her hand tightening around his, “Theodora told me what happened; she described the men. Had you heard that there was a gypsy fair in town?”
“I had. Meg told me that some of the sillier of my ballerinas sneaked off to visit it on Friday night. I know I cannot control them outside the theatre but I had hoped that they might have a little more sense. Obviously I was wrong.” Madame was once one of those ballerinas, talked into a trip to the fair with her suitor; unbeknown to Erik she had been somewhere in the sea of goggling faces beyond his cage, horrified, pulling Jules Giry away from the sight. Her voice dripped disapproval. “What are you suggesting, Christine?” she asked.
The mattress shifted slightly and there was a rough, wet sensation on Erik’s cheek as Bruno rasped it with his tongue, evidently realising that his master was awake. It took all of Erik’s self-control not to move; the conversation was too interesting to interrupt. With a whine the dog flopped back down, head this time on Erik’s upper arm. Christine must have noticed for the next moment Bruno was being lifted from the bed, much to his displeasure; he gave an annoyed yap, which Christine quickly shushed.
“Hush, Bruno, you’ll wake him!” she admonished the spaniel. Bruno must have settled down again as she returned her attention to Antoinette. “Do you not find it an incredible coincidence that not long after a gypsy carnival arrives in Paris Erik is brutally attacked? He has told me something about his time in the fairs and I know what they did to him.”
“There have been carnivals and circuses in town many times over the last twenty years and Erik has suffered no persecution,” Antoinette pointed out. “Is it really likely that the man who abducted and imprisoned him is still travelling the country?”
Erik almost opened his mouth to dispute that assumption, but Christine beat him to it. “For most of that time, Erik was hiding from the world; even if they were looking they would not have found him. But he has stepped out of the darkness and I cannot see that this incident, following so closely on those articles about us in the press, can be merely chance, Madame. Those men took nothing from him; if it was just a random attack, why leave his gold watch and a wallet full of money? They could have just hit him over the head, stripped him of his valuables and run, but Teddy told me that they were enjoying pummelling him, giving him no chance to defend himself. No opportunist thief would do such a thing.”
Antoinette made a non-committal noise. “Look at him, Madame,” Christine said. “Do you really believe that a group of thieves would batter a man like this for a few hundred francs?”
Another pause, a longer one this time, until eventually Madame Giry sighed. “No,” she replied, “No, I don’t, though in truth I don’t want to believe it. If you could have seen what I did in that fair, Christine, though God forbid that you ever do...” There was a rustle of fabric, and Erik assumed she had sat down. He tensed, bracing himself for the revelations she was sure to make, for the facts that he could not bring himself to tell Christine. “I cannot bear the thought that they kept a man of such talent and genius like a beast, worse than a beast! A dog would have received more consideration. In my mind’s eye I can still see that cage with its padlock, and its occupant... he was filthy, Christine, dressed in rags and so thin..! I know that he is not the healthiest specimen now but back then he was emaciated, as though they barely fed him. He does not remember it but he looked straight at me, and though his face was terrible to behold I saw such sadness, such loneliness in his eyes... I wanted with all my heart to help him but there was nothing I could do.”
“You did help him, Madame,” Christine told her as Erik struggled to comprehend the implication of the ballet mistress’s words. One face among many, the only one to have regarded him with compassion during those dreadful years, and yet he could not recall that fleeting moment when their eyes met. “Maybe not then, but you did help. I am sure Erik would agree that he has at last gained the life he always dreamed of because of you.”
Antoinette sniffed, and Erik’s eyes (as far as they were able) almost flew open in surprise. He had never heard her cry before. Could she really be crying over him? “If he has regained any humanity it is because of you, my dear, not me,” she said. “That he draws his strength from your love is obvious to anyone who sees you together.”
“But you saw the good in him before anyone else did,” Christine insisted. “I know he helped you that night when Buquet tried to...” She trailed off, obviously embarrassed at referring to such a sordid situation, but continued after a moment’s thought, her tone firm, “If you had not helped him in return none of us would be here now. Who can say what might have happened? Erik might never have even noticed me, and I would still be trying to convince everyone that I could make it as a dancer. Maybe I would have married Raoul, or I might not have even joined the Opera in the first place.”
Silence fell between the two women. Erik had almost dropped off when Madame Giry spoke again.
“If these gypsies were behind the attack,” she said, surprisingly tentative, “what do you think Erik will do?”
It was a few moments before Christine replied, and Erik could have wept at the trace of fear in her voice. “I don’t know, Madame. I really don’t know.”
Author: charleygirl
Word Count: 3832
Rating: G
Genre: General, Drama
Characters Involved: Erik the Phantom, Christine Daae, Madame Giry
Disclaimer: The Phantom of the Opera is the creation of Gaston Leroux but probably these days copyright to Andrew Lloyd Webber.
Summary: Resurfacing...
It was a feeling Erik knew well, this sense of dislocation.
Through the fog that filled his brain some coherent part of him knew he could not be dead; there was too much pain, a sensation that had always kept him tied to the world he had so often longed to leave, pleading with a God in which he did not really believe to end his suffering. So many times in the past he had struggled through the haze to return to a cold reality which saw him curled into a ball on the dirty straw of his cage, having tried instinctively while consciousness crept upon him to protect himself from the prods and kicks aimed in his direction.
“Wake up, you filthy animal! No one pays to watch you sleep!”
If he failed to respond, a rude awakening would come upon him in the form of an ice-cold bucket of rainwater, poured over his head to the jeers and simian laughter of Grigore and his cohorts. Even at the tender age of fourteen the boy had been proving himself to be as thoroughly unpleasant as his father. He and his friends would point and mock as Erik struggled to get up, limbs weak and back on fire from the beating he had endured just a few hours before. In the depths of winter they would leave him to shiver, soaked to the bone, until one of the women, anxious to preserve Dumitru’s prize attraction, would shove a blanket and perhaps a cup of some foul-tasting broth through the bars. It was little enough, but in the face of daily torment Erik had found himself almost pathetically grateful for their concern.
So strange... how could he stay here in this warm cocoon of darkness? He had been beaten again, he knew that much, but where were the taunts and catcalls he always remembered? Why was there no one trying to drag him from the comforting arms of Morpheus just so that they could laugh and spit in his face and call him scum? Perhaps they were waiting, trying to lull him into a false sense of security, just so that they could rain down some worse indignity upon his head...
He listened, but could hear nothing but his heartbeat, loud in his ears. An attempt to open his eyes proved so terribly painful that he abandoned it almost immediately; even the tiniest movement sent daggers of fire through his skull. Somewhere, in the dim recesses of his mind, he recalled being hit, could feel the blow smashing him across the back of the head. But Dumitru never hit from behind unless he was using the whip; he liked to aim for Erik’s face, as though he wanted to enhance the horror with which his captive had already been blessed.
Gradually the fog began to lift, and the pain became, if possible, ten times worse. It seemed that there was not a part of him that did not ache or burn; coming back to himself he took an involuntary deep breath and thought that he might faint again from the agony it created. He choked, unable to draw in enough air, and each cough increased the pain to such an extent that it seemed his chest was about to rip asunder. His head throbbed, blurring the vision in the eye he had managed to force open even further. Panicking, he flailed uselessly at empty air until his hand found the solid flesh of another person; clutching at them desperately, past caring if they were friend or foe, he held on tight, convinced now that he was about to breathe his last.
“Shh... Erik, calm down, it’s all right. It’s all right, it’s only me!”
That voice! He knew that voice, so sweet and musical even when it was not raised in song. Erik tried his best to bring his coughing under control but each shallow breath he tried to take just made the fit worse. He groaned, tears of pain gathering in the corners of his eyes as the fire in his chest burned deeper and deeper with each inhalation. There was a hand, a gentle hand, on his cheek, his deformed cheek, stroking it tenderly as another lifted him with careful movements, propping him against something warm and soft until he could finally catch his breath. He lay there, exhausted, gasping like a landed fish as his body shuddered from the effort. So much energy should not need to be expended upon something as simple and mundane as breathing in and out.
“There, there,” the voice said, close to his ear, and he realised with a little embarrassment that his head was resting on someone’s shoulder. Light fingers carded through his hair. “Better now?” He tried to nod, but it was barely a twitch. Whoever it was giving him comfort seemed to understand, for they shifted slightly, raising his head higher. An arm snaked around him, a hand resting on his waist. “Your ribs are bruised, but the doctor says they will heal. Would you like some water?”
Erik opened his mouth to ask who she was, where he was and what had happened, but all that emerged was a croak. Before he could try to speak again a glass was held to his lips and his saviour was encouraging him to drink; he took a sip, and then another, water trickling into his parched mouth. He coughed a little and the glass was withdrawn; careful hands laid him back onto what he realised were soft pillows, bundled together so that he did not have to lie flat. Almost at the same moment he became aware that he was not lying amongst filthy, scratchy straw but on a well-stuffed mattress beneath light blankets. The girl – from the timbre of her voice she could not be much more than a girl – was French, not Romany. Could it be possible that the cage and the fair were nothing more than a nightmare, an illusion conjured from the hellish pits of his own mind?
Her hand was stroking his hair again, just as he had always dreamed his mother might do. A sigh escaped him for the sensation was calming, soothing the thundering in his skull for a few moments. Erik found himself relaxing into that wonderful touch, and he drifted off again, finally feeling safe.
________________________________________
When he woke once more he had no idea how much time had passed.
The mist which shrouded his thoughts thankfully seemed to have receded, but the pain was making itself felt now with a vengeance. It took a supreme effort to open his eyes – or rather eye, as for some reason the right one refused to crack more than a slit through which it was impossible to see anything. It took a couple of blinks to clear the vision in the left, but once it had Erik was able to make out his surroundings. Beyond him the room was extravagantly-decorated, all pink frills and gilded cherubs as though someone had reached into the past and dragged Marie Antoinette’s boudoir to modern Paris; he felt quite nauseous at the sight and wondered where the hell he was. The bed in which he lay was a huge four-poster affair, the mattress wide enough to comfortably accommodate at least three people the size of La Carlotta and the satin counterpane decorated with embroidered birds and flowers. There was a bucolic scene of shepherdesses painted on the footboard which brought to mind The Dance of the Country Nymphs from Il Muto; not a particularly welcome thought.
An irritating flash of white hovered above his left eye, right on the edge of his vision, and he lifted a hand that trembled infuriatingly to push it away; his fingers encountered a thick bandage, and further investigation revealed that his head was almost entirely covered in the stuff. Beneath a nightshirt that was definitely not his own lay more bandages; an experimental inhalation confirmed the damage to his ribs. Not broken, he decided with some relief, but certainly seriously bruised, maybe even cracked. He tried to lift his head, and fell back with a hiss of pain; that was evidently the site of the worst injury.
After a few moments of lying perfectly still and breathing carefully so as not to irritate his ribs he tried turning on the pillow, moving slowly and steeling himself for the agony that was sure to follow. The world tilted and spun madly and he had to wait, gritting his teeth, until it righted itself again and he could see the armchair that had been drawn up beside the bed and its sleeping occupant. Under a patchwork blanket, a snoozing Bruno on her lap, was Christine.
She looked tired; her beautiful face was white and drawn, the usually lustrous chocolate brown curls that surrounded it tangled and frizzed. A dark shadow hung from her closed left eye, the only one he could see from the angle at which her head rested against the cushions of the chair. With a combined pang of gratitude and guilt Erik realised that it was her voice he had been hearing, it was she who had held him and comforted him and in his addled state of mind he had not recognised her. Instinctively he reached out to hold her, to reassure her, but he was too weak to even sit up unaided. Thirsty and unable to resist the lure of the half full glass of water on the bedside table he tried to grasp it; it just evaded his fingers and the movement pulled on his abused ribs, drawing from him an involuntary moan which startled Christine from her uneasy slumber. Jumping from the chair and almost tipping the bewildered spaniel onto the floor, she was at his side in an instant, hovering over him with concern writ large in her big dark eyes.
“Erik?” she said hesitantly, and he frowned, an expression he instantly regretted for the discomfort it produced was exquisite. Christine lifted a finger to touch his cheek. “Erik, do you... do you know me?”
“How could I not?” he rasped, and her features lit up with relief. “My apologies, my dear, for causing you so much distress.”
“Oh, Erik..!” With a cry of joy she sat down on the bed, taking his hand in hers; he was sure that had she not been mindful of his injuries she would have flung herself into his arms. She bent her head and pressed her lips to his, and he could taste the salt of her tears as they ran down her face. Erik forced himself to lift his hand and wipe them away before they trickled down her chin and onto her rumpled dress.
“Don’t cry, Christine,” he whispered. “I’ll live.”
She shook her head. “I’m happy,” she told him, “and glad that you’re all right. I know you will be all right, now. I was so worried - ” With a little hiccup she turned away, brushing at her eyes with the back of her free hand. The diamond of her engagement ring sparkled in the lamplight.
Concerned himself now, Erik squeezed her fingers. “Christine?”
Her lip quivered. “Erik, you’ve been unconscious for three days. The doctor said that the longer it took you to wake up the greater chance there would be of permanent damage...” Her voice cracked and the tears began anew.
“Oh, Christine. Mon ange, come here...” He sighed and raised his arm, and she curled up on the bed beside him, almost desperate for his embrace. Bruno, unable to contain himself any longer and obviously resentful of being denied their attention, barked and leapt up onto the counterpane, settling down on Erik’s other side, his head on the Phantom’s leg. They both watched the dog in amusement, and Erik stroked his curly head. Bruno’s coat was neatly trimmed, his hair brushed and shining as though he had recently been given a good bath. “Someone has clearly been looked after in my absence,” Erik remarked.
Christine giggled. “Oh, that was Teddy. She said he needed tidying up.”
“Teddy? Teddy Merriman?” he asked in surprise. “What has she to do with it?”
“This is her house. Well, the house she’s renting,” Christine added. “She’s been wonderful, Erik; I don’t know what I would have done without her.” She explained how Mademoiselle Merriman and Monsieur Patterson-Smythe had found him and brought him home. Erik dimly remembered someone talking to him as he lay in the street and realised that it must have been Theodora. “I have no idea how we will manage to thank her; she has even taken over Gilda for me.”
Startled, Erik raised his head to look at her, forgetting the pain for a moment. He hissed as it stabbed at him behind the eyes. Anxiously Christine felt his forehead as best she could through the bandages, little fingers lightly stroking his distorted cheek.
“Oh, my poor dear, you must be so uncomfortable. Would you like something for the pain?”
Usually Erik did not like to take opiates or painkillers but if it was this agonising just to shift his head he would have to give in and accept whatever assistance was offered. Christine got up and emptied a packet that had doubtless been left by whatever medical practitioner had been called to the house, stirring it into the glass of water and supporting his head with infinite care to allow him to drink. When she had set him back down and he no longer felt as though he were whirling on a merry-go-round, he demanded,
“Why the devil should Theodora Merriman have to sing Gilda for you?”
“Because I have been here, of course. I cannot be in two places at once,” she told him as though he were absurdly obtuse for asking the question. “The managers have extended Rigoletto’s run now that the new production will be delayed; Teddy offered to take my place as she has played Gilda in New York and in London.”
“We have understudies for such eventualities.”
“I know, but as you gave the role of Maddalena to Sophie Leclerc in place of Augustine there is no one else. Marie cannot manage it and Monsieur Reyer would not hear of altering the score for one of the altos - ”
“Quite right too,” Erik muttered. “Whoever heard of such a thing?”
“Well, then, someone was needed in the part and as Teddy says, the show must go on,” said Christine, straightening the sheets.
“Anyone with any sense at all would put Mademoiselle Leclerc in as Gilda and move Marie Durant to Maddalena; the part is written for a mezzo after all. The whole opera will be turned upside down! Why not ruin it completely and have the men play the female roles?” Despite the pounding in his head Erik tried to sit up. His arms wobbled and shook as he struggled to support himself on his elbows and Christine had to catch him before he collapsed again. He fought against her; Bruno yapped in alarm as he was almost tipped off the bed. “Get me some paper; I’ll write instructions for Reyer. He needs to alter the casting at once and pull everyone in for extra rehearsal.”
“There isn’t time! Erik, calm down, please, it’s not important - ”
“Of course it’s important!” he shouted. “Our triumph will descend into farce if I don’t do something!”
“Erik, please, my darling, you’ll only injure yourself further,” Christine said, easing him back down onto the mattress. “You need to rest.”
Reluctantly, he gave in, allowing her to settle him amongst the pillows. She pulled the covers up to his chin, tucking him in as though he were a child. Suddenly weary, Erik couldn’t find the strength to argue. His eyelids drooped and as Christine began to hum a lullaby he welcomed sleep as it pulled him under once more.
________________________________________
“Does he remember anything about the attack?”
A new voice drew Erik back towards the waking world. His thoughts moved sluggishly; it took several moments for him to recognise its owner as Madame Giry. She was speaking softly, her tone a far cry from its usual authoritative self. Still dreadfully tired, Erik found that he was quite content to just lay there and listen; it was too much effort to even try and open his eyes.
“I haven’t asked him and he has said nothing so far.” That was Christine. He could feel her fingers laced through his own, her skin warm and smooth. “I don’t want to confuse him, not while he’s still so weak.”
“Mademoiselle Merriman has been offering to give a statement to the police if Erik wishes to report the incident.”
“I know, but I don’t think he will, Madame.”
“Oh?” Erik could almost see Antoinette lifting an eyebrow. “What makes you say that?”
There was a pause, as though Christine was gathering her thoughts, and then she said, her hand tightening around his, “Theodora told me what happened; she described the men. Had you heard that there was a gypsy fair in town?”
“I had. Meg told me that some of the sillier of my ballerinas sneaked off to visit it on Friday night. I know I cannot control them outside the theatre but I had hoped that they might have a little more sense. Obviously I was wrong.” Madame was once one of those ballerinas, talked into a trip to the fair with her suitor; unbeknown to Erik she had been somewhere in the sea of goggling faces beyond his cage, horrified, pulling Jules Giry away from the sight. Her voice dripped disapproval. “What are you suggesting, Christine?” she asked.
The mattress shifted slightly and there was a rough, wet sensation on Erik’s cheek as Bruno rasped it with his tongue, evidently realising that his master was awake. It took all of Erik’s self-control not to move; the conversation was too interesting to interrupt. With a whine the dog flopped back down, head this time on Erik’s upper arm. Christine must have noticed for the next moment Bruno was being lifted from the bed, much to his displeasure; he gave an annoyed yap, which Christine quickly shushed.
“Hush, Bruno, you’ll wake him!” she admonished the spaniel. Bruno must have settled down again as she returned her attention to Antoinette. “Do you not find it an incredible coincidence that not long after a gypsy carnival arrives in Paris Erik is brutally attacked? He has told me something about his time in the fairs and I know what they did to him.”
“There have been carnivals and circuses in town many times over the last twenty years and Erik has suffered no persecution,” Antoinette pointed out. “Is it really likely that the man who abducted and imprisoned him is still travelling the country?”
Erik almost opened his mouth to dispute that assumption, but Christine beat him to it. “For most of that time, Erik was hiding from the world; even if they were looking they would not have found him. But he has stepped out of the darkness and I cannot see that this incident, following so closely on those articles about us in the press, can be merely chance, Madame. Those men took nothing from him; if it was just a random attack, why leave his gold watch and a wallet full of money? They could have just hit him over the head, stripped him of his valuables and run, but Teddy told me that they were enjoying pummelling him, giving him no chance to defend himself. No opportunist thief would do such a thing.”
Antoinette made a non-committal noise. “Look at him, Madame,” Christine said. “Do you really believe that a group of thieves would batter a man like this for a few hundred francs?”
Another pause, a longer one this time, until eventually Madame Giry sighed. “No,” she replied, “No, I don’t, though in truth I don’t want to believe it. If you could have seen what I did in that fair, Christine, though God forbid that you ever do...” There was a rustle of fabric, and Erik assumed she had sat down. He tensed, bracing himself for the revelations she was sure to make, for the facts that he could not bring himself to tell Christine. “I cannot bear the thought that they kept a man of such talent and genius like a beast, worse than a beast! A dog would have received more consideration. In my mind’s eye I can still see that cage with its padlock, and its occupant... he was filthy, Christine, dressed in rags and so thin..! I know that he is not the healthiest specimen now but back then he was emaciated, as though they barely fed him. He does not remember it but he looked straight at me, and though his face was terrible to behold I saw such sadness, such loneliness in his eyes... I wanted with all my heart to help him but there was nothing I could do.”
“You did help him, Madame,” Christine told her as Erik struggled to comprehend the implication of the ballet mistress’s words. One face among many, the only one to have regarded him with compassion during those dreadful years, and yet he could not recall that fleeting moment when their eyes met. “Maybe not then, but you did help. I am sure Erik would agree that he has at last gained the life he always dreamed of because of you.”
Antoinette sniffed, and Erik’s eyes (as far as they were able) almost flew open in surprise. He had never heard her cry before. Could she really be crying over him? “If he has regained any humanity it is because of you, my dear, not me,” she said. “That he draws his strength from your love is obvious to anyone who sees you together.”
“But you saw the good in him before anyone else did,” Christine insisted. “I know he helped you that night when Buquet tried to...” She trailed off, obviously embarrassed at referring to such a sordid situation, but continued after a moment’s thought, her tone firm, “If you had not helped him in return none of us would be here now. Who can say what might have happened? Erik might never have even noticed me, and I would still be trying to convince everyone that I could make it as a dancer. Maybe I would have married Raoul, or I might not have even joined the Opera in the first place.”
Silence fell between the two women. Erik had almost dropped off when Madame Giry spoke again.
“If these gypsies were behind the attack,” she said, surprisingly tentative, “what do you think Erik will do?”
It was a few moments before Christine replied, and Erik could have wept at the trace of fear in her voice. “I don’t know, Madame. I really don’t know.”
