"I killed him."
Those three words hit her like a bucket of ice-cold water thrown straight at her face, but Erik spoke them so casually, as if they did not change everything she thought she knew about him.
"Have you ever wondered why I wear a mask, Christine?"
Not wishing to offend or anger him any further, her first instinct was to say no, although evidently that would not have been the truth, but Erik did not wait for her reply.
"It is true that you have never asked me, but surely you must have wanted to many times, inquisitive creature that you are. Well then, let me satisfy your curiosity, my dear." His sarcastic, sneering tone raised the hair on the back of her neck. He appeared calm on the outside, but his behaviour now frightened her much more than any of his fits of anger ever had.
He came into the room and walked over to the wall of portraits where she was standing. Instinctively, she took a few steps back, wanting to put more distance between herself and this man who suddenly seemed so radically different from the Erik she had got to know over the past few weeks. The kindness which she had so often seen shining through underneath his detached and controlled demeanour had been erased in a matter of seconds.
"The truth is," he continued, "I wear a mask because if I did not, you – and everyone else who ever had the misfortune of laying eyes on my monstrous visage – would run away screaming. You see, I was born with a terrible deformity covering half my face. I will spare you the details, but suffice it to say it is so horrible that when I was born, my father looked at me once and immediately turned away in disgust, proclaiming there and then that he wanted nothing more to do with me."
So it was a disfigurement he was hiding. Could it truly be so gruesome as he claimed, Christine wondered? How hideous must a face be for a father to refuse to look at his own son?
"From my first breath, I was a terrible disappointment to my father," Erik went on. "He was a very wealthy man with a title, and so the one thing he wanted most in life was an heir, a perfect little boy to pass on his fortune and title to. Well, perfect I was most certainly not and so I was of no importance to him.
My mother on the other hand was not concerned with producing an heir. What she wanted was a child, a little human being on whom she could bestow all the love which she would have gladly given to my father if only he had let her. She wanted a baby and that is what she got. What I looked like mattered very little to her. From the moment I was put into her arms, I became her entire world.
She made a half mask out of cloth to cover the disfigured side of my face because my father demanded it, but when it was just the two of us, she would remove the mask and cover my mangled skin with kisses, smiling at me as if I were the most beautiful baby in the world. Of course I do not remember any of this myself. I read it in her diary once, which is my only source of knowledge concerning my first few years on this earth, as my father refused to speak to me at all if it were not strictly necessary, even after my mother was gone."
He was silent for a moment, lost in thought. Judging by the faraway, empty look in his eyes, the memories he was caught up in were not exactly happy ones. How dreadful it must have been, Christine thought, for such a young child to live with a father who barely acknowledged his existence, making him feel as if he were not worthy of his attention.
Eventually Erik shook himself out of his reverie and went on.
"My upbringing and education were left completely to my mother, without any interference from my father or anyone else in the household, and she could not have been happier about that. As far back as I can recall, the two of us were always together. One of my earliest memories of her is me sitting on her lap in front of a roaring fire while she was humming a lullaby in my ear. She loved music. I can hardly remember a time when she was not singing. I started singing along with her even before I could talk."
As he spoke about his mother, the grim look on Erik's face gave way, a soft smile stealing across his features instead, which told Christine more than his words ever could. He loved this woman with all his heart. Christine could not help a tentative smile forming on her lips in return, although she strongly suspected this story would not have a happy ending.
"My mother was the one who taught me how to play the piano. At first she would lift me up onto her lap and I would watch in utter fascination as her fingers moved gracefully across the ivory keys. It did not take long before simply watching did not satisfy my curiosity any longer, and I would reach out my little fingers towards the keys, wanting to see if they would produce that same lovely sound in response to my own touch. Instead of slapping my hands away and reprimanding me for interrupting her playing, which I am sure is what my father would have expected her to do, my mother covered my hands with hers and placed them on the keys, guiding me through a simple tune, repeating it a few times until I had memorized it and was able to play it by myself.
From that moment on, music became an integral part of our life. My mother taught me everything she knew until, by the age of six, I played better than she ever had. She started hiring music tutors for me, but with each new one, it would take less time before I had mastered all that they could teach me. In the end, I took to writing my own music and my mother would listen to me for hours on end, claiming that my compositions were the most beautiful pieces of music she had ever heard – surely an exaggeration born from motherly affection."
Christine did not think his mother had been exaggerating. She had heard some of the pieces Erik had written and knew how brilliant a composer he was. It would not surprise her if he had been this gifted ever since he was a little boy, although she refrained from telling him so. He did not give the impression that any compliments, no matter how well meant, would be happily received at the moment.
"Those times were the happiest of my life," Erik continued, "and I believe they might have been for my mother as well. But the fairy tale could not last forever. As the years passed, my father grew more and more anxious at still not having his perfect little heir, and he took every opportunity to insinuate that my mother was the one to blame. She felt guilty for disappointing him and the radiant smiles she had directed at me so often grew less and less frequent.
It took several more years for her to conceive, but eventually, shortly after I had turned ten, she informed my father that she was with child again. He was elated of course, but he was also terrified that something would go wrong during the pregnancy, and so he immediately had my mother confined to her chambers, forbidding her from even leaving her bed unless it was truly necessary. He insisted that she should not be disturbed under any circumstances, which meant that for the first time in my life I was separated from my mother.
At first I would go to her rooms every day, begging her maid, Antoinette Giry, who was – next to the family physician – the only one allowed in the room, to let me see her, but as I was denied time and again I finally gave up and sought comfort in my music. The piano was my sole companion in those days.
For all my father's precautions, my mother still went into labour a month early. The physician was sent for immediately, but he was out of town tending to another patient. Mrs Giry, barely sixteen at the time, did whatever she could to assist my mother. Unfortunately, she was not trained to deal with the complications that occurred during the birth. I could hear my mother's screams all the way across the house. I still hear them in my dreams sometimes. I think that was the first time in my life I truly knew fear."
For a moment Christine thought of her own mother, ripped away from her when she was still a little girl, so young that she could barely remember her face anymore. She thought of her father when they had first arrived at Erik's estate, his body wrecked with terrible coughs, his face so deathly pale she was almost certain she would lose him too. She knew the fear and pain Erik must have felt and she wanted nothing more than to go to him and take him in her arms, to tell him that it was alright, that she understood, to offer the comfort that his father should have given him at the time. However, he was clearly not telling her all of this to earn her sympathy. She had to remind herself that only a few minutes ago, he had confessed to killing his own brother, and although she could not see a cold-blooded killer in him, she was well aware it would be better to keep her distance for now.
"By the time the physician arrived, my mother was already dead," Erik said, without even the slightest change in his tone or his expression, as if he were not talking about what must have been one of the most painful moments in his life. "Not that my father cared much about that. The only thing that mattered to him was the baby she had given birth to: a small yet healthy little boy with blue eyes and blond hair, just like his father, and, most importantly, with a perfect, unmarred face.
From that moment on, my father's world revolved solely around that little boy, whom he called Simon, after himself. I had never held any value to him. He already resented me for my blemished face, and on top of that my features, from the form of my chin to the peculiar colour of my eyes, very closely resembled those of my mother, his dead wife. There was nothing in my appearance to suggest that I was truly his son. I might as well have been a bastard. Now that he finally had the undeniably legitimate heir he had been waiting for, he could ignore my existence altogether.
It was an arrangement that suited us both quite well. As he focused all his attention on my little brother, I was left to my own devices, free to do as I pleased, although there was not much to hold my interest in those first few months after my mother's passing. I had lost the only person who had ever loved me despite my flaws, and there was no one there to comfort me in my grief. I felt like I had lost everything. Everything except music.
Music was my only solace. I threw myself into it as if my life depended on it, which it more or less did. It was the only thing to keep me sane, the only company I had. I spent every hour between daybreak and sunset behind the piano, in this very room, composing requiems and other haunting, melancholy melodies. I poured all my pain and sorrow into that music, until one day my father grew tired of hearing those dismal, depressing songs over and over. He told me to stop, more than once, threatening to beat me or lock me up if I did not obey, but how could I? It was all I had left.
When my father could bear it no longer and it became clear that his threats did not affect me, he found another way to obtain what he wanted. One morning, when I entered the room, the piano was gone. My father had had it removed. If there was no instrument, there was no way for me to continue making that awful noise, he said."
Christine's eyes filled with tears as she listened to Erik's story. She wished he would pause and give her a moment to process it all. How could his own father have been so cruel as to take away the only comfort of a boy who was mourning the loss of the most important person in his life? If only he could have had the same loving kind of father as her own. How different his life could have been.
"Needless to say, I was hysterical. I turned on my father and started hitting him, screaming and screeching at him like a wild animal. The servants had to drag me away and lock me in my room – not the room where I had been sleeping for the last ten years, but a new, smaller one, in the east wing, furthest away from my father's chambers.
I do not recall how long it took me to calm down. It might have been several hours. What I do remember is that when I finally regained my composure and took in my surroundings, I discovered a second door in the room, hidden behind the wall drapes. I went to inspect it more closely, expecting to find it locked, but when I pressed down the handle, the door swung open easily enough. Behind that door was a long, dark and narrow winding hallway, which led to another door. This one was heavier than the one in my room, and I had to use all my weight to push it open, but once I did, I found myself in the library.
To this day, I still do not know whose idea it was to build a secret passageway from that bedroom to the library, but I was grateful to whoever it was, for it allowed me a way to escape from my room without my father's knowledge. I took refuge there, reasoning that if I could not play music, at least I could read about it. I read every book on music I could find, and when I had exhausted those, I moved on to art in general, and from there to history, architecture, science, anything that would keep my mind occupied.
That is how I filled my days for the next five years. It was quiet and peaceful, except for the few occasions when my father was away on business. Then Simon would find me, no matter where I was hiding, begging me to play with him. I for my part wanted nothing to do with the child. In my eyes, he was the reason my mother was dead, and I did everything I could think of to keep him away. I would reveal my face to him in an attempt to scare him, but the horror which lay hidden behind my mask did not seem to bother him as it did my father or the servants. When that did not work, I would try to ignore him until he gave up and went away, which did not happen as often as I would have liked, as the child was just as stubborn as I was, or I would search for ways to distract him so I could slip away.
Most of the time I managed to escape eventually, until one winter's day I did not. My father was out of town again, and the governess had clearly lost sight of her little charge, for Simon found me here, in my mother's old sitting room, and pleaded with me to take him outside, to play in the snow. I did not care what he wanted. It was the anniversary of my mother's death and I only wished to find a way to feel close to her again.
"I was sitting on the ground, right there where you are standing now," he said, looking over at Christine, pointing at the carpet beneath her feet. "That is where her piano once stood. I had my eyes closed and was trying to think of the happy moments I had shared with her, of her voice as she sang to me, but all I could hear was my brother's whining. He simply would not leave me alone, so I finally gave in, hoping that I would find a way to escape as soon as possible.
I took him to the lake. He wanted to see if it was frozen, and it was. In his childish enthusiasm he ran straight onto the ice. It had only been freezing for a day or two, and I knew the ice was not yet sturdy enough to hold him, but I did not stop him."
At this point, Christine had a strong suspicion of how the story would end. She did not want to hear the rest, did not want to listen to the inevitable conclusion. More than anything, she wanted to beg Erik to stop talking. Perhaps if he did not speak those words aloud, they could pretend nothing had happened. But Erik did not pay any mind to what she did or did not want to hear and continued relentlessly, with an even tone and expressionless face, as if he were discussing the weather rather than a family tragedy.
"The ice gave way beneath his feet within seconds. I watched my brother plunge into the freezing cold water, and still I remained where I was. For a brief moment, I imagined that if the boy died and I was the only son again, my father might grow to love me after all. Of course, that was nothing more than a silly fantasy. My father had not cared for me before Simon was born and there was no reason to believe he would do so if his beloved son was dead, especially not when he learned I was the cause of Simon's demise.
As soon as I realized that, I knew that I must do something to help him, that I could not let an innocent child die. After all, none of it was the boy's fault. He could not help it that he had been born, nor that he was more loved by our father than I ever would. But no matter how badly I wanted to run towards him, my legs would not move. I was rooted to the spot, unable to do anything but stare at the hole in the ice into which my brother had disappeared."
Tears were freely streaming down Christine's face now. She wept silently for the little boy who had lost his life that day, and for the man who had carried the blame for it ever since.
"I do not recall how long I stood there. It might have been hours before the servants found me. I could see the panic and horror in their eyes when they realized what had happened, I could see their lips moving as they screamed at me, but I did not hear them. Even if I had, I would not have been able to answer them. I just stood there, numb. Eventually someone must have taken me away, for I did not see how they pulled his body out of the water.
When my father returned and learned what had happened, he did not even come to find me. He did not yell at me or curse me or beat me, although I would have deserved all of it. In a way I think I even wanted it, longed to be punished for my horrid deeds, to be treated like the monster I was. But of course, my father would never stoop so low as to give me what I wanted.
I did hear my father's grief-stricken wail as the servants told him the news of Simon's death, but I did not see him again until the next morning, when I found him dangling from the end of a rope in his study."
Christine let out a stifled sob. She did not feel particularly sympathetic towards Erik's father, but she would not wish a fate such as his on anyone. More than anything, however, she felt a deep sorrow for Erik. How long had he carried that burden on his own, feeling responsible for not one but two deaths within his own family? Had he ever told anyone else, or was she the first to hear this confession?
"I did not attend their funerals. I was well aware that by that time, the whole village had learned what had happened. One night, I overheard one of the servants say that the villagers referred to me as 'the devil' and 'evil incarnate', and that they had known tragedy was bound to fall upon our family from the moment they heard about my deformity. They would never accept or forgive me, and so I decided to never set foot in that village again.
The only good thing to come out of it all was that as my father's only living heir and new master of the estate, I was now entirely free to live my life as I pleased. I dismissed most of the servants, especially those who had been loyal to my father, keeping on only those who seemed to despise or fear me the least. From that moment on, I lived a mostly solitary existence, and I was perfectly fine with that. Until you came along."
Erik turned towards her then, and for the first time since he had started telling his story he looked Christine in the eye. The empty look on his face was gone now. Instead, there was a malicious glint in his eyes that made her want to run, but she did not dare move. He was quite a bit taller than her and probably a good deal faster as well. If she tried to flee and he decided to go after her, she would not stand a chance.
"There you were. Such a lovely, innocent little thing, blissfully unaware of my sins. How tempting it was to pretend that I was like any other man, that I had nothing to hide. But you just had to uncover my secrets, didn't you? Like a prying Pandora, you simply had to find out. Well, Christine, now you know the truth. I am a monster."
"You're not," Christine whispered, shaking her head. If it had not been for the deathly silence in the room, Erik might not have heard her.
A bitter laugh escaped his lips.
"Am I not?," he asked, taking a few steps towards her. "Have you not listened to what I have told you? I am a murderer, Christine. I stood by and watched my five-year-old brother die."
She moved back as he approached, trying to maintain some distance between them, but soon her back hit the wall behind her and she had nowhere to go. She was trapped.
"It was an accident," she argued desperately. Whether she was trying to convince him or herself, she was not entirely sure. "A terrible accident. That does not make you a monster."
"Is that what you believe, still? Are you truly that naïve?" he sneered. "Well, if my horrible deeds cannot convince you of what I truly am, maybe a glance at my face will."
In one swift motion, he ripped off his mask, letting it fall to the ground. Christine barely had time to take in the horrifying sight of his bare face before he was storming towards her. He grabbed her wrist, his grip harsh and unforgiving. She let out a yelp of pain, but Erik was undeterred.
"Do you see now, Christine? Surely you must agree that this can only be the face of a monster." He brought her hand to his misshapen skin then, forcing her to feel the rough, distorted flesh beneath her fingers. "Touch it!" he screamed, grinning like a madman, "Feast your eyes! This is the face of the man you have been living with these past few months. Do you think it a handsome face, Christine? Are you happy now that you finally know what lay hidden behind the mask all this time?"
His grip on her wrist tightened as she struggled to get away. His nails were digging painfully into her skin. If he squeezed any harder, she feared he might draw blood. No matter how hard she tried to fight him off, pushing against his chest with her free hand as she attempted to pull her aching arm out of his firm grasp, he was much stronger than she was and would not let go of her. She whimpered, both out of pain and fear. She had witnessed his violent temper before, but he had never lost control so completely, nor had he ever physically harmed her. Until now.
"Please, Erik, you're hurting me," she sobbed. He stilled, and for a moment he merely stood there, still gripping her wrist, looking at her like he did not comprehend what she was saying, until suddenly his expression changed. He quickly let go of her arm then, slowly walking backwards and staring at her in horror, as if it only now dawned on him what he had done.
She cradled her injured wrist against her chest as she stared back at him. The man standing in front of her was not the same man who had danced with her on her birthday, who had read to her and had taken care of when she was ill. This man was a complete stranger to her. She did not know him, nor did she have any desire to. There was only one thing she could do now.
Hoping that he was too shocked by his own actions to go after her, she ran out the door and down the hallway, stumbling down the stairs until she reached the front door. She did not stop by her room to fetch her belongings or her cloak first, not wanting to give Erik more time to stop her. She threw open the heavy wooden door and kept running without sparing a thought for the darkness of the early hours or the cold and dreary weather. It did not matter where she was going. Promise or no promise, she could not stay here another minute.