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Chapter 50

Erik

Reading Hugo's literary works should have been a good way to pass the time waiting for Christine and Jules to return. Before they'd gone, we'd gotten all the information we could from Buquet before he began saying, over and over, "I don't know". So yes, to pass the time, I would sit in a chair, stoke a sleeping Ayesha in my lap, and read. It would have been effective.

Had it not been for two problems.

One, Jules and Christine were taking longer than I'd hoped, though I supposed it took time to search through that disorderly mound of paper on the stagehand's workstation.

Two, that very stagehand was currently attempting to speak with me.

Attempting, because I was not speaking back.

"Monsieur," Buquet said, after many a valiant attempt, and I could feel his eyes on me while I cleared my throat and turned the page. "You seem to have a reasonable mind."

I sighed, finally responding, "And what, pray tell, gave you that impression?"

"You were the only one who wanted to see the evidence." He leaned forward. "You wanted to see it before jumping to any more conclusions."

"So what if I did?"

"Perhaps you will be reasonable enough to untie me, if only for a moment. My wrists are beginning to-"

"I am trying to read a book, Buquet, and your voice is not exactly soothing. Would you please shut up?"

The sound of the front door opening made my ears prick, and Ayesha hopped down from my lap. Before I could even think about putting my book down or standing up, I heard feet pounding upon the floor in the foyer, coming closer.

"Erik!" Jules's voice, frantic. I shot to my feet. He'd called me 'Erik', not 'sir', and though it shocked me, I had no time to think on it. "Erik, it's not Buquet! It's not Buquet!"

He appeared in the doorway, face bare and stark white. His eyes looked as though they might bulge out of his skull.

Buquet sucked in a breath. "Jules Bernard?" he breathed. "Is that you?" He looked between us. "Where the hell am-"

Jules ignored him. "Christine. He has Christine."

I dropped the book. It landed on the ground with a thud. "Who?"

Buquet sputtered, "Christine? Christine Daae?"

"Richard Firmin."

"The one that's missing-"

"Shut up, man!" At my icy glare - a glare that matched my frozen heart and stomach - Buquet closed his trap. I looked back at Jules. "Firmin. Manager Firmin."

"Yes. Yes." M. Bernard swallowed thickly. "I left her side - only for a moment," he added hastily when I inhaled and lifted my head, "to try and switch on the lights in that dismally dark theatre, and I ran into him, hiding in the wings...in the dark...like some sort of-"

Ghost. Like a ghost. He didn't finish the thought, looking away from me.

He continued, voice shaking and rapid - a blustering wind rattling my own bones with anger and horror. "He whispered to me - told me if I made a sound, any sort of indication to Christine to run, that he'd kill us both. He told me that Christine would vanish, and should I tell anyone that Firmin was there, he would hurt my family. Kill them. He told me to leave through the back. But I came here instead." He gripped the doorjamb, his knuckles paling. "No one can find out - my family needs to stay safe. But if Christine is to stay alive, we need to find and deal with him ourselves."

"I knew it," said Buquet. "I knew that man was too nice. Too...involved, emotionally, in this whole affair-"

"And how," I hissed, whipping my gaze to him; he seemed to shrink, "should we know that you're not in on this whole affair?"

"I'm not, Monsieur. I swear it."

"Sending Christine to the surface to get her alone with a killer?"

"How should I have known you'd send her? I didn't care who went! I just want to go home."

"Why? So you can drink yourself to a stupor again?"

"Yes. And after tonight, I will need it."

"Where." I advanced on him. He leaned back against the couch, grimacing in unbridled fear. My voice was low, threatening. "Where is she?"

"With Firmin, clearly, Monsieur."

"And where is that?"

"I've told you, I don't-"

"Hotel."

Both Buquet and I turned to Jules when he spoke the word softly. He had a contemplative look in his wide eyes. He brought his gaze slowly up to mine as I said, "What was that, M. Bernard?"

"The hotel," he repeated in a whisper. "The one he's rehabilitating. You know about it."

"I don't," I said, "actually."

"I do," said Buquet. He seemed to be quite sober now, I realized. Being held hostage might do that. "The man brings it up anytime he's in the mood to sound charitable. Haven't heard anything about it actually being cleaned up - it's not even fit for the homeless population it's meant for."

"Have you noticed the windows?" asked Jules.

We merely stared at him.

"They're boarded up."

"So?" I said.

"People board up their windows for two reasons," he elaborated. "To keep things out-"

"And," I finished, cold understanding gripping me, "to keep things in."

Jules nodded. "And to hide things they don't want others to see."