Chapter 1: The Opera Populaire
Amaze at the difference the candlelight makes on the building. The life and power of the breathing lights allow the world to see a different sight. And oh, but it creaks with the wind, and that's nothing but expected, so we'll follow the beams of light and settle on the stage where I believe the story goes that many a cast would envy such lavish spectacles.
An elephant, a centerpiece in this opera, is wheeled forward as the chorus sings a rousing song of victory. Hannibal, atop the elephant, sits as an imposing figure who had intimidated many a buffet in his time.
But more important than that was his beloved, who I could safely say everyone could hear over the ruckus of any botched aria. Her voice warbled like a warbler after a couple rounds and it shrieked the high notes like a monkey and bellowed the low notes like a bassoon that desperately needed repairs. It was, in other words, little surprise that La Gatita, or the Kitten if you'd prefer, was a world-wide opera sensation.
The rehearsal was going along splendidly, much to the satisfaction of a one Opera House Owner, Madame Hive, who was currently showing an older gentleman and a young man around the place. "This is, ah, yes, Madame La Gatita. I'm sure you've heard much about her, Messieurs."
"Oh, very much," said the older one. He was built like a jackal, and spoke with a faint British accent. 'Likely a rich industrialist from across the water,' concluded the watching skeleton section – perhaps I need explain.
I had dubbed them the Skeletons after how ghastly thin the dancers must appear in a good light. Why, perhaps it's the style of the day, but the dancers, so cute and dainty, living as if their parents had sent them to a private tutor to prepare them for a life of luxury. I'm sure not a one of them is not better off because of the added effort in removing all nutrition from their body.
But, back at hand, these skeletal wrecks of girls stared upon the younger man. A handsome young man except for the shade of color of his skin. He blushed, half imagined it to be purple to match his bizarre complexion and looked away.
Perhaps I should introduce these two strange people. Sebastian is Sebastian Blood, who was indeed a rich industrialist from England. Particularly successful in a small business creating a particularly popular coat, he eventually turned away from the rustic beginnings – such as they were in those days – of the ever expanding factory – factories now – to more higher callings for a man of means. A long-time admirer of France, he took the opportunity of buying the Opera House as the chance of a lifetime. And he took it.
But, being a cunning man, he knew very well that he couldn't leave such a business without the aid of a friend of his who had a son, now seventeen, who was a budding musician and was living in Paris at the same time. He approached them, and with their permission, he asked the boy, Garfield, if he would be interested. Young Mr. Logan agreed eagerly, most likely because of the skeleton gallery I mentioned earlier, and from my experiences with the man, he was perhaps the most understanding of the plight of the many denizens of the opera house, seen and unseen.
So, these two, businessman and apprentice, were not touring the opera. The old lady who had owned the place after her husband's unfortunate demise was highly cooperative and almost eager, too eager, to sell. Blood named his price at a startling low price that they did not in fact reveal to me. But if they had been allowed to hear of the tales that the little girls whispered to each other behind the scenes.
The dancers had been whispering for weeks about why the old lady had finally decided to retire. Her husband had left a rather large retainer for her, and she could have comfortably lived for the rest of her days, but she had stayed on for the last ten years, without a word of complaint.
"She's selling because of the ghost," the pale-faced girl they called La Jinx. "I know it." A smaller girl, with long blond hair and a pushed-up nose snorted angrily. "You know it too, Tara."
Tara Markov was said to be a princess, but that wasn't to be believed. Mere poppycock, nothing more. There is no evidence to support the claims that the King of Markovia ever had an illegitimate child and it seems that many forget that's where the story seems to end.
I am confident in my research. It was exhaustive. She was in fact under the care of an older girl, who I believe she roomed with. Her job in the Opera House was to teach dance. For her age – she was either 19 or 20, but I am not sure because it isn't right to ask a girl for her age – she was most efficient at it. Her dark eyes and pale complexion had the girls whispering at the same time.
La Jinx again jested, "Perhaps the Demoness scared her off."
"Madame Raven?" Tara whispered. "No, I do not believe so. I would have noticed, I believe."
"You would have, could have, didn't."
"So cruel!" Tara sighed.
"But truthful!" said the pale and strange girl. "The Demoness, she's everywhere."
"I don't believe it's Madame Raven," Tara said softly, but with growing determination. "I believe it was the ghost!" This caused the entire room to break into a large squabble. Girls tittered about the stories old Mumbeux had told them.
"I heard he has a face like a skull!" one of the younger girls shrieked. "There's not a nose left!"
"Not a nose?" Tara scoffed. "I heard it wasn't missing, you just can't see it, it's so pale."
"You're both wrong!" Another laughed at their folly, and gestured wildly about her face as if wafting flames that did not exist. "Instead of a normal face, his face is on fire, burning bright. The rat catcher said so."
"You believe this poppy-cock?" la Jinx scoffed. "There is no Phantom of the Opera!" This brought a deadly silence to the room and no one dared even cough lest they be mistaken for la Jinx. Finally, one dared to speak up.
"You, you should not say such things!"
Superstition ruled the Opera House, and of all of them, the Opera Ghost, their "Fantome" is most revered. His wrath was unparalleled. Should he overhear someone speak ill of him, he would swoop in from the shadows, and with his face, a skull-like herald of doom.
x x x x x x x
Perhaps I should tell you a story that took place the week before the visit by Sebastian Blood. It's a strange tale that features prominently many of the patrons of the Opera House gathering for a gala dinner. La Gatita had been such a rousing success that they were celebrating her apparent triumph the following night.
She had left, herself, but the rest of the assembly were talking about business. The Madame Hive was quiet during the proceedings, as her mind had already been decided as to the course of her actions, but one of the guests, who had occupied a seat on the side, unnoticed until he made a strange laugh.
Why he had been unnoticed was quite confusing. Gaunt and imposing, he had at once appeared as if from a waking nightmare, skeletal, and his face had, they said, lacked a nose. The evening suit he wore hung off him almost sickeningly. Those who sat next to him would agree with the assessment that there was, likely, a nose there, but it was such that it appeared to be nothing at all.
And I imagine he smiled a very dry smile as the guests roused from their seats by the sudden intrusion. "I merely wished to say that I wish the Madame well in her future endeavors," said this strange guest. "I'm sure she has informed you of her plans."
"I had not," the Madame Hive said.
"I'm sorry, then," the stranger said. "I have spoiled the surprise twist to your charming little performance. And such a gala, Madame, fitting. Though La Gatita is, as always, an unequaled bore."
In her tired state, the Madame did not dare argue with the strange guest, but those around had begun to whisper to each other. Who was this strange gentleman and how did he know the Madame?
One dared speak, a gentleman, Comte de Malchior, and he looked quite angry at the intrusion by the uncouth speaker. "Where have you come from and how dare you disturb a private dinner such as this!"
"Oh, yes," coughed the figure, "How dare I. I dare, my friend, because I am superior to you." It was all he said, and Malchior's rants went on longer. I believe some said that he went on for ten minutes, completely making a fool of himself in front of the assembled court, because as he finished, the mysterious man had vanished just as soon as he had appeared.
The Madame was not perturbed. "He comes and he goes," she was said to have told an assistant. "One minute there, the next minute gone. He's most incredible, like that. I do not believe in ghosts, but this once, just this once, I will make an exception."
The words la Jinx had spoken that inspired such furor from the assembled girls did have some merit, by all appearances. There was a carriage accident a few days later where the Comte de Malchior received a grievous head trauma with a rather thick book of occult practices that a fellow traveler had been carrying with him. Some say that the horses had been spooked by a man dressed in black and white that moved across the street like a flash of lightning.
The Ghost was vengeful.
x x x x x x x
He was a vitriolic defender of common sense and taste in the decadent atmosphere, and his presence nagged at the conscious of the girls as they strutted about in practicing a grand dance sequence celebrating the warrior Hannibal's great victory.
"Perhaps La Gatita will honor us with a performance?" Blood asked. The blonde prima donna beamed at the opportunity and her breast swelled with expectation of the great outpouring of gratitude she would receive.
I'm not particularly sure, but I believe it was the aria – oh, my memory goes so quickly! Perhaps if I hum a few bars you'll remember. "Think of me, think of me fondly, when we've said goodbye."
The Phantom was vengeful. Particularly when forced to endure something that offended his taste so, and the Madame Hive knew well that he had no love for the Kitten, though no one knew how or why she knew.
He would not tolerate disbelief. La Jinx may have scoffed at the childish behavior of Mademoiselle Markov, but perhaps they had merited it. For at the rehearsal, as La Gatita had begun to warble an aria, the set began to fall apart and rip and tear. A sandbag fell nearly behind la Jinx.
It had been the final straw for La Gatita.
"That is it! I will not continue!"
"Madame, please," Madame Hive said, testily, "It was merely an accident. Is that not so, Mumbeux?"
"Yes, an accident. Old decayed rope. It happens," Mumbeux said from above the stage. The older man rushed about suspiciously, and Blood didn't seem entirely trusting towards him.
"These things, they do happen." Sebastian and Garfield seemed satisfied by this response, but the younger's ears were perked at the whispering among the dancers, particularly a strangely vibrant young girl suddenly very pale, and a thin blonde girl.
"It's the ghost!" they seemed to cry.
"Yes, well, until these things stop happening," La Gatita cried, "This thing does not happen!" She stormed out, followed by an entourage that hovered protectively around them, including the Hannibal from before.
Sebastian Blood was needlessly perplexed and confounded. A night before a gala event and the star had left the stage in a huff. Perhaps it was the way of the Prima Donna, always knowing that the owners would come crawling on hand and knees and demanding that she let them return.
Well, they'd see. "Can anyone else sing this part?" he asked. The girls seemed to draw back, except for one. Tara Markov.
"Let Kori Anders sing it, Monsieur," she said defiantly.
"Yes," said a voice from the audience. A man they had not seen before was sitting there, watching the rehearsal in the robes of a man from Persia. His face was covered by a half mask that went over his face and the most ghastly glow emerged from beneath it. "Let her sing for you. I have heard that she has been well taught."
The girl emerged quietly at first. The paleness of her skin was caused by shock at the horrible racket that accident earlier had created. Her bright red hair and honest green eyes looked at her audience of businessmen and women, and a strange Persian who she had not seen before.
And she opened her mouth to sing.
Of course, everyone knows the rest. It is, how they say in England, history. Oh? You say you are unfamiliar with the debut of the wonderful soprano Kori Anders? Such a pity! Her debut was a triumph. Not a single note out of place, and the encore performance from Romeo and Juliet left the crowd in tears, absolute tears from the sheer passion.
The discovery of the century! That's what they had declared her. I, of course being a man of taste and sophistication, decided to abstain from such pedestrian praises. I called it the greatest triumph ever afforded an understudy. Especially one for someone as self-centered as the Kitten.
So, in the time it took for twilight to give way to dusk, Kori Anders had gone from young and unsure of herself to the biggest face in the Opera World. Such a thing! Such a wonderful, wonderful thing.
But success brings many demons, my friend, and these two were disguised well.
x x x x x x x
Mlle. Anders has a rather interesting past. It's shrouded much in mystery due to the demise of her dear, dear beloved father before her arrival in the Opera Populaire as a dancer and a chorus girl. Much of what I know I have learned from the memoirs of her guardians while she lived in Paris.
But I think most charming is the story of what happened while she was vacationing by the sea when she was a little girl. It had been a lovely holiday, and the girl and her father had been enjoying much time together, as the man loved his daughter very much, when in a sudden gale wind, her scarf out into the cold, cold sea.
Kori was in tears, and her father tried his best to comfort him, when from out from the crowds a young boy leapt into the sea, fully clothed, and swam and caught the scarf and brought it to the girl, with a smile and a sneeze.
But they couldn't leave the poor boy die of pnemeunia, so they took him along in his carriage and he listened to the father play his violin so softly and sadly, and looked at the strange girl who was so enraptured by the song.
This boy was the Vicomte de Chagny, Richard.
He was not born into the family, but to a poor family who had lost their patriarch at sea almost six months before his birth, leaving him alone with his ailing mother, who named the boy Richard just before she breathed her last.
Such was the unfortunate tale of Richard, but it would not end there. For fortune smiled upon the little orphan boy, and the Comte de Chagny, sole inheritor of the Chagny estate, took pity on the boy and took him in.
Raised in fineries, Richard never became miserly, but became a compassionate young man who enjoyed music and dancing. He was a popular young bachelor who had many a lady hanging on his every word, but the bashful child! He never noticed.
I'm envious, I apologize.
He had taken the opera in for the evening and, much to his surprise, saw that the girl who had taken the place of La Gatita was, in fact, Kori Anders! "Can it be?" he asked, "Kori! Bravo! Bravo!"
She was really not a bit the girl that once he knew, now more developed and pretty. But she was still as he remembered -- an image of untarnished purity. Her dress was sparkling like white lightning and her hair was tied up in elegant curls that feel on her face like the licks of the flames.
He could hardly believe his good fortune as he descended the grand staircase in the main foyer, passing around the nobs who hobnobbed their way through the evening. It was, as he came to the people he was searching for, very fortunate, as they were speaking with his guardian, the Comte de Chagny.
"Monsieur Blood tells me that a familiar face had her big gala premier tonight, Richard," he said, immediately upon noticing him. "Have a drink. Mlle. Kori Anders. Why, that's a name I haven't heard in years. Richard was quite taken with the young girl."
"I wouldn't say that. I was hardly 13."
"Hardly 13, and madly in love," his guardian joked. "Oh, Monsieur le Mayor, just the man I wanted to see!" He danced around and began speaking with the mayor, leaving Richard with the beaming face of Monsieur Blood and his young assistant, Monsieur Logan.
"Monsieur Richard le Vicomte de Chagny! A pleasure!" Blood said. Garfield was much less open with his greeting, but they seemed eager to have his patronage to the opera house. "So, you and the chorus girl were childhood friends."
"Yes," Richard said, awkwardly. His guardian had set him up for this, he had thought, and decided to play along. "Dreadfully long ago."
"Yes, it must be so difficult to see a friend so close and yet, so very far," M. Blood continued. Messieurs le Directors were most eager to taunt him with the fruit of a rare meeting with the girl, especially since the dressing rooms were out of bounds to the patrons. Richard decided to continue hanging the cheese for the mice to try and climb to.
"Oh, so far, it seemed at the time. Yet it was close. Perhaps Box Five would have been closer."
"Box Five, oh yes." Seemingly as if on cue, there was a sound as if someone had fallen down the top step and landed in a very loud heap on the ground. A cry of pain and a gasp of disbelief as the man who had been occupying the seat found himself with a broken leg at the bottom of the floor.
Blood and Logan ran, dashing through, while Richard stood, glass in hand, monitoring the events and taking a careful drink to keep himself from seeming suspicious. So crowded, one could be forgiven for wishing to stay out of the way of the ruckus, and after all, he had a captive audience with Messieurs Blood and Logan. He could play this out. Still, he had walked down those stairs himself, how could someone fall. It wasn't as if they could run.
This was ponderous to Richard, who vowed to test it at a later date. But business, for now, could take a back seat to pleasure, especially when meeting an old friend would being a welcome respite from the past week.
"Oh, oh Monsieur!" Blood could be heard saying over the din. "I'm so sorry, I will have the man who cleaned these stairs reprimanded immediately!"
Richard mused, wondering how that could fix the matter any. I had stumbled upon Richard's secret in an amusing fashion that plays into this story. But it nagged slightly on his conscious at this point. He had been trained by an expert to detect even the slightest mistake in speech and to find every little detail in a mystery that could go unsolved.
Of course, he kept that behind a vapid smile of a gentleman fop. It served him well, and no one was guarded against his kindly smile and comforting suggestion that "You can tell me everything."
And he would let them tell him everything and let justice be swift as on the wings of the robin, coming with the warm winds of spring to thaw deceit's winter.
x x x x x x x
When at last Monsieur Blood had returned, Richard had convinced him to allow him to speak with Mademoiselle Anders in her dressing room and he was escorted past the dancing girls, practicing ballet under the cool and dangerous eye of a woman dressed in dark blues and shades of anger in her hair. Perhaps she was a gypsy, to explain her exotic appearance, but her skin was shades too fair for that. Instead, she appeared to be French thoroughly, and no one could take that away from her as her nose looked down at them.
"What is he doing back here!" she demanded, when they passed her. "The Ghost will be most displeased in your actions!"
"The Ghost?" Richard asked, curious. However, his interrogation was cut off by a wave of the hand from Monsieur Logan.
"She's a bit unsettled," he warned him, aside, and turned to the Madame Dance Instructor. "Madame Raven, perhaps you should watch your tongue. This is Monsieur le Vicomte de Chagny!"
"The Vicomte, the Mayor, the King, or God Himself would displease him if he saw him wandering upon his stage!" Raven said with an accusing finger. "You would bring disaster on us all."
Richard did not let it pass his attention that the way she spoke was as in a reprimanding whisper, of a mother in public telling her selfish child to stop its misbehavior without drawing attention to her. She was truly afraid of this Ghost. Whoever it was, and why, he would be most interested in learning, but again, the respite was most definitely foremost in his mind, and he requested the messieurs to lead him forward, ignoring the warnings of the woman.
When they approached the dressing room, the owners took their leave, offering wishes of good luck, and prayers for much patronage, and allowed him to knock upon the door himself. And as he did, he awaited a response that never came.
"Mademoiselle?" he asked, through the closed door. "Please, would you let me in?"
He noticed a pair of eyes watching him from behind a corner, and he leaned back to see who was watching him. Strands of blonde hair draped down to the ground, and a dancer lay curled, eyes closed in the prayer that if she cannot see him, he cannot see her.
He laughed comfortingly. Perhaps the talk of a ghost had shaken him somewhat. Though, certainly, there could be a ghost in this place, without a doubt. It looked older than the front. There was less care to make it look as modern and glamorous as the day it was constructed. Instead, it had fallen pray to repairs and haphazard decoration. There was a homey feel, and it just added to the sense that something was wrong back behind the opera.
He knocked again, "Please, Mademoiselle, I am an admirer of yours who wishes to give you congratulations on a fine performance."
He leaned his ear against the door, and could hear a voice as crimson as silk and as warm as thunder declare, "What an ignorant fool, this slave of fashion. Grasping at my triumph! What do you bring to your door, girl?"
"Oh, you are so cruel," the voice said, a moaning, incompetent voice that he immediately identified as Kori's. It felt strained and worried, and at all unable to relate the feelings of despair she was subjected to. "How can you say that, when I sing only for you!"
"Ah," said the voice, now as inviting as night, "Then no emperor has received a gift so fine, so perfectly crafted." Richard's spine was shivering as the tone became perfect and romantic as velvet and satin.
"My dear," it said, "The angels themselves wept tonight."
