Part Thirteen
Christine fell to the ground with the grace of a drunk on the streets. She lay there sprawled un-prettily and most un-lady like. Of course the entire ball room went up in gasps, while a few 'gentleman' tip-toed to look over the sea of heads. Attempting to catch a glimpse of some undergarments.
The women began to flock around the Countess de'Chagny and fan her. Fluttering their fans this way and that. Getting caught amongst their arms, dressing being stepped on as more joined the circle.
"Ladies! Ladies please!" called Madame de' Andrews. She was an elderly woman, her auburn hair already turning gray. Wife to Doctor Andrews she was extremely respected. "She needs some room to breathe!"
The younger of the women obeyed her plea to move, but that didn't make the circle any smaller. Since the rest of the elder women remained, fluttering their fans.
Thankfully quite a few had remained away to stand in their groups and gossip. Countess Helena, was one of those women her large group of women remaining at her side, fluttering fans.
Only Helena's attention wasn't focused on Christine it was focused on the Duchess and Countess of Belfour. She knew of the Countess but the Duchess...Helena had questions and she was going to answer them. One way or the other.
She watched as the Duchess came down, leaving her husbands side. Holding her long skirts in a dainty hand, moving with ease down the steps to stand beside Madeline Countess of Belfour. Ladies Andrea and Elizabeth, to left their husbands sides.
The quartet of women made their own little group. Speaking and fluttering behind their fans, of what. Helena also wanted to know.
Everyone watched quietly as Christine was taken to a settee and fanned by the few women that bothered themselves with the task. Raoul fanned her with his kerchief he might as well have been fanning her with a piece of lint. The man was an imbecile!
"Oh my! Poor Madame de'Chagny!" Madeline said sadly behind her fluttering fan. Although Esperanza couldn't help but notice the tone: She didn't really care. What caught her attention was de'Chagny.
"Countess de'Chagny? Christine Daae?" questioned Esperanza. Madeline looked down at the Duchess beside her and nodded her head.
Madeline was a tall woman, but slender. She was well into her mid-forties it was rumored that George had married her just for extra land-holding. But when you saw the pair, they were so in love how could anyone say such things?
Her hair was a red flame, long but not as long as most. It was cut to mid-back, shimmering with golden highlights. Her hair breathed of life. Her nose was large, her cheeks and forehead broad as well. Yet they came together quite well with her blue eyes and wispy lips. Madeline was what a person would consider handsome, not beautiful.
Continuing on after he nod, she filled Esperanza in with more information she had heard. It would be easy getting around this City, since she felt as though she knew Christine. In one way or another.
"Yes, the daughter of that hideous excuse of a violinist, and former Opera singer. Things went bad there, the Opera House has been shut down since the fire. They say she's estranged, bad dreams: Something of an Opera Ghost. I believe Lady Andrews husband was called to the residence to check her condition. All he could come up with was an over active imagination." she whispered, fluttering her fan more, when Helena began to come closer.
"Oh no, here comes Countess de'Reims. A very bad sort she isn't one to trifle with. " Esperanza looked at the woman, and eyed her just the same way Helena was eyeing her. Could she handle the woman? She more than likely could.
"Ah. Countess! How have you been Madeline?" Helena called, walking up to the four, giving them a curtsey. Of course they returned it, except for Esperanza. She wasn't about to bow down to some viper of a woman.
"Oh I have been well! We arrived here safely thanks to the Duke!" Madeline supplied, Andrea and Elizabeth watching Helena with narrowed eyes.
"So I heard!" looking to Esperanza " Your husband must be a very Gallant man. I am certain that most men would not have done what he did."
"Then.." Esperanza began " They wouldn't be much of men now would they?"
"Oh! I suppose not" Helena replied prettily, her temper building beneath her pleasant exterior.
"I do grow tired of standing! Why not come and join us Ladies? Our table has ample room", She offered hopefully. Madeline was about to accept the offer, where as Andrea and Elizabeth were dreading it. Esperanza was the one to respond.
"Thank you Countess, but I must say I prefer the table selected for us. It is less crowded, and there are other Ladies to speak of. However it was a pleasure meeting you perhaps we can talk some other time?" With that Esperanza dismissed Helena like she was no more than a fly. That angered her beyond comprehension she was THE COUNTESS of Paris! She knew everything, she ran almost everything and she was NOT about to be out done by some Duchess.
Helena watched Esperanza's back as she walked away, linking her arm through her husbands. Then it dawned on her, what ailed the Duke to wear a mask? However she should ask the same of Lady Andrea's husband the Baron, who had returned recently. Only he wore a leather patch over one of his eyes. The Marquis also had marred features from his service.
Turning Helena looked at the women that always followed her. They were like some tail that she would cut one off then another would come in her place.
"Come ladies we shall speak with the Duchess and Countess before the night is through" a few began to protest, the Duchess wouldn't like being approached by Helena. Something would sure have to be made through that 'conversation'.
Helena had JUST the plan to repay the Duchess for her. Rudeness.
When the smelling salts were brought, Madam Andrews lightly moved it beneath Christine's nose. Turning her head away from the smell with displeasure she began to awaken. Raoul sat watching expectantly, hoping that whatever had over-come his wife had surpassed. He was wrong though, she sat bolt-up right and looked around.
No longer the main stage of commotion the music had begun again. People were dancing, and laughing the food being brought out to the tables. Ladies talked in their groups on the right of the large room. The men in their fine suits stood by the larger area of tables, settees and armchairs, cigar smoke wafting from the area like a dragon lived there.
"Christine?.." Raoul asked softly. Turning her fearful wide eyes to him she grabbed his hand.
"Raoul! It's him!" she cried, getting a few glances. He sat down next to her, attempting to calm her and most of all shush her.
"Christine he's a Duke! How can a Duke be, be that Thing?" he said and he was serious. Honestly how could such a hideous creature gain such a title, and a beautiful wife?
Remembering the woman he looked at her and his body tightened with a want, a need a lust that he had never experienced. Not even with Christine, and he knew why that was. Christine had been a childhood Love, and it had driven him to save her. Now he was regretting it with the most part of his days.
When his wife didn't seem to like what he was saying he went to hold her hands. He was too late, Christine was out of the settee and running across the ball room. Shoving people from her way, her goal. That beast of a man, his back turned to her. She would rip off the mask and the wig, and make everyone see!
Raoul gave chase after her, but what was the point? She was several steps ahead of him, and the bumping bodies also got in his way.
Christine was almost to her goal when she forgot that ONE person. The Murderess, or now known as The DUCHESS. Esperanza came between Christine and Erik, grabbing the woman-girl-child by the hair and yanking her back. Christine turned on Esperanza, trying to claw at her with tooth and nail.
A trumpeter played a foul note as the music died down, the dancing stopped, all eyes were on the estranged wife of the Count. Raoul groaned inwardly, damn her! Curse her! How he wished he could be rid of her, but he had said those words: I do. That's what kept him married for now. Yanking Christine off the Duchess, she growled like a wild-cat.
"Damn you! Let me go!" Christine bit at him. Pointing a hand at Erik whom was currently very worried. Worried for his Love, worried of being caught. Then his eyes focused on the woman being held. It was...Christine.
The body of a woman, her hair was still just a long dark and lovely. Her cheeks were flushed with her anger and that anger was as always directed at him. Yet it astonished him that he didnt feel even a pinch of sadness that she was no longer his. He hardly even noticed the former boy he had fought wrecklessly for her. Trying to keep her away from him.
No Christine would've been a wrong choice for him. After all he had his Angel, his love. And right now she was ready to fight tooth and nail for him just the same.
"That man! He is the Devil's Child! It's the Phantom of the Opera! Beware! Beware!" gasps went up. A few because they believed they had been there that night. Others at the lack of courtesy, they looked to the Duke to see if he would let such a thing happen. However it wasn't the Duke that would speak but his wife.
"Devil's Child? Madame, have some courtesy! This is MY husband, how could he be the Devil's child? The only Devil in here at current is you! I believe you become over-excited and that your husband should take you home." Esperanza snapped, walking towards her although she kept her distance. " How can you call him a Phantom? He looks quite human to me! But a Phantom of all things! Of an Opera!" she said twirling around looking at everyone.
They began to laugh and chuckle, Christine took note, and her fighting died down a bit. The woman was turning things upon her well not really she was the one whom did his. The Duchess was shaming Raoul not her. Oh Raoul... Forgive me.
"I suppose that is somewhat true seeing as my husband and I do love the arts. But he is NO phantom!"
Growling with renewed anger, Christine shot another accusing finger at him.
"And that hideous distortion of a face! That deformity? How could anyone call IT a man!" More gasps, more fluttering of fans, and plenty more whispers began. Esperanza had lost the fun in it, she attacked viciously with her words.
"How dare you say such things of my husband. You little Jezebel! How dare you accuse a man whom served this Kingdom's defense. During the Franco-Prussian War! A veteran rightfully earned the respects due him. And a DUKE to finish with! My husband, a very handsome man Countess de'Chagny. But there is a price to pay in a war. A man's beautiful features are often the price!" whirling Esperanza pointed to the Baron and Marquis.
"Will you crucify them as well Countess? Since one lacks an eye and the other has much scars upon his face? Will that be enough to make them Phantoms? Ghosts? Will it make them Less of the MEN than they actually are?" Looking into Christine's eyes she bore that into her. How Christine had over-looked the man beneath the deformity, and left him. When Christine didn't answer Esperanza smirked.
"I thought not, I can see now Countess that YOU and I shall not have good terms." turning her back to them, she returned to Erik, who gently took her into his arms. It was discreet of course nothing to make more fodder of topics. While Raoul lead his screaming wife to the courtyard, being escorted out. So much for business...
No one dared ask questions of Erik's mask any longer. Esperanza had shown them to ask was to get a tongue lashing beyond their imagination. However there was one last person that needed to be dealt with.
Helena filled her wine glass to the brim. Carefully she began to make her way towards the Duchess a smirk upon her lips the Ladies of her group. Being smarter than she backed off and simply watched.
Esperanza's back was to Helena but she knew what was coming. Watching the woman's reflection in the silver pitcher on the table beside her, Esperanza filled her own wine glass to the brim. Madeline, Andrea, and Elizabeth both tried to hide their smiles, while their husbands quirked brows in wonder. Looking to see Helena with a full glass and the Duchess with a full glass. This night was far from over. They ignored it and took big drinks of their beverages, screeching would ensue very soon.
Almost there...Helena thought, and when she was about to perform her little act of tripping. Esperanza turned abruptly, and ACCIDENTALLY hit the glass that Helena held with her own. The bump forced both glasses towards Helena and the contents, as liquid and gravity mix, spilled out all over her.
Mouth agape, Helena's flock of ladies gasping, while others hid their smiles but couldn't hide their laughs. Helena looked up down at the Duchess who, placed a hand to her lips, eyes wide. But Helena knew that look she'd played it a million times. Then Esperanza spoke.
"Oh my...How clumsy of me." Erik smiled into his cup, the night was young. Two Countesses down and the rest of Paris to go.
How could a man be so lucky?