"I remember you, friend."
"I'm most certain you do."
"Do you remember me?"
"Of course. I remember you with that part of my myself that remembers the fire and the brimstone, haunt. Begone, curse me no more with the memory."
"Quiet, we must be quiet, I pray you. Who are you to call me a haunt, old friend? But silence, please, there are so many who wish you out of the opera house."
"Their fear keeps them in strings, little puppets dangling from my hands. We've nothing to fear from them."
"As you say. But yet you stay here, in the shadowed corners, in the falling dust and falling hands of the clock, biding your time--the Phantom of the Opera."
"What do you want, serpent? Speak quickly."
"Or what? I'll taste the noose that has spilled so much blood?"
"Ah, what deeds men do to achieve their goals."
"And what is your goal, old friend? That strumpet, Christine?"
"Don't ever insult that girl in my hearing again."
"Think you to get your fair Ophelia? It will only end in madness, phantom! Christine will never love you."
"I'll make her love me. Once I work my magic in her sweet mind she'll be mine forever, I'll finally--I'll finally..."
"Ha! You think you can control her, but your tremulous voice proves your mind wrong. Best control your own heart before you go snatching away someone else's! 'Give me that man that is not passion's slave--'"
"Silence!"
"Listen to yourself, a rat caught in a trap! Your voice shakes and runs away without you, your eyes burn like fire through the dark--yes, you claim to see all that goes on here, but you can't even see into your own damned, aching heart!"
"Begone, demon!"
"Like a wraith you watch from the shadows, slinking from desperate curtain to despairing box, but you forget! Wraiths, my friend, are simply haunts from children's tales, from infant's nightmares; they are as substantial as air, as solid as those white puffs which scuttle across a fair day on the wind's whim. Why would she follow a nightmare, or yearn to embrace a cloud?"'
"Clouds hold mystery, demon. All young children yearn to touch those same entrancing 'puffs', as you call them. I shall draw her in with my own kind of lofty, uncatchable magic--"
"And she will find herself embracing nothing, and lose interest. What do you have to offer her?"
"Music! Sweet, rich, dark, intoxicating melodies that will dance across her nerves and shake them, that will fill her heart and soul and head until she must let fly with an angel-song that will charge the air around us, sending us to another realm of rapturous, rapturous music! Music will lift us, send us soaring to the star-splashed heavens on feathered wings, spinning upward, upward--"
"Music, he says! Music, says the Phantom! Perhaps a man of shadows lives on music alone as a pixie lives on belief, but your dear Christine needs a more substantial bread: sunlight, structure, her own kind. All you'll ever have is an eternity of darkness and a handful of notes."
"I've warned you to leave, fool, and you should have listened! Now descend to Hell from whence you came!"
"What--no--rope? Ha--your hands---slick--with--doubt--She'll--never--love--"
"No, no, no, no! You're wong, wrong, demon! Devil! Descend, descend, descend into the fire of your error, and look up at me when I am triumphant, when I am raptured by the angel--the angel of music! She'll love me, love me--love me, I'll make sure--she will! Now. Have you no--no answer... for that... no... answer... she'll love me, she will, she'll love me for... for the music... the music... yes...... yes.... yes....."
"Yes...."
"I'm most certain you do."
"Do you remember me?"
"Of course. I remember you with that part of my myself that remembers the fire and the brimstone, haunt. Begone, curse me no more with the memory."
"Quiet, we must be quiet, I pray you. Who are you to call me a haunt, old friend? But silence, please, there are so many who wish you out of the opera house."
"Their fear keeps them in strings, little puppets dangling from my hands. We've nothing to fear from them."
"As you say. But yet you stay here, in the shadowed corners, in the falling dust and falling hands of the clock, biding your time--the Phantom of the Opera."
"What do you want, serpent? Speak quickly."
"Or what? I'll taste the noose that has spilled so much blood?"
"Ah, what deeds men do to achieve their goals."
"And what is your goal, old friend? That strumpet, Christine?"
"Don't ever insult that girl in my hearing again."
"Think you to get your fair Ophelia? It will only end in madness, phantom! Christine will never love you."
"I'll make her love me. Once I work my magic in her sweet mind she'll be mine forever, I'll finally--I'll finally..."
"Ha! You think you can control her, but your tremulous voice proves your mind wrong. Best control your own heart before you go snatching away someone else's! 'Give me that man that is not passion's slave--'"
"Silence!"
"Listen to yourself, a rat caught in a trap! Your voice shakes and runs away without you, your eyes burn like fire through the dark--yes, you claim to see all that goes on here, but you can't even see into your own damned, aching heart!"
"Begone, demon!"
"Like a wraith you watch from the shadows, slinking from desperate curtain to despairing box, but you forget! Wraiths, my friend, are simply haunts from children's tales, from infant's nightmares; they are as substantial as air, as solid as those white puffs which scuttle across a fair day on the wind's whim. Why would she follow a nightmare, or yearn to embrace a cloud?"'
"Clouds hold mystery, demon. All young children yearn to touch those same entrancing 'puffs', as you call them. I shall draw her in with my own kind of lofty, uncatchable magic--"
"And she will find herself embracing nothing, and lose interest. What do you have to offer her?"
"Music! Sweet, rich, dark, intoxicating melodies that will dance across her nerves and shake them, that will fill her heart and soul and head until she must let fly with an angel-song that will charge the air around us, sending us to another realm of rapturous, rapturous music! Music will lift us, send us soaring to the star-splashed heavens on feathered wings, spinning upward, upward--"
"Music, he says! Music, says the Phantom! Perhaps a man of shadows lives on music alone as a pixie lives on belief, but your dear Christine needs a more substantial bread: sunlight, structure, her own kind. All you'll ever have is an eternity of darkness and a handful of notes."
"I've warned you to leave, fool, and you should have listened! Now descend to Hell from whence you came!"
"What--no--rope? Ha--your hands---slick--with--doubt--She'll--never--love--"
"No, no, no, no! You're wong, wrong, demon! Devil! Descend, descend, descend into the fire of your error, and look up at me when I am triumphant, when I am raptured by the angel--the angel of music! She'll love me, love me--love me, I'll make sure--she will! Now. Have you no--no answer... for that... no... answer... she'll love me, she will, she'll love me for... for the music... the music... yes...... yes.... yes....."
"Yes...."