Note: This is the last Erik-less chapter. He's coming…

Chapter 3: Silent and Resigned:

The day my mother was to return from Paris, it began to snow, the last snow of the winter. Grandmère said she was unsure whether or not Maman would attempt to come home despite the weather. She had only been gone a day, but I couldn't help worrying about the affect the journey would have on Maman's already poor health. As we waited, I peered out the front window, while Grandmère paced back and forth in front of the roaring fire in the sitting room.

"The boy will never forgive me if anything happens to her," said Grandmère, more to herself than to me. "The boy" was what Grandmère still called Papa sometimes. I wished he was here. He would never have let Maman put herself at risk by going to Paris in her condition.

Just then the carriage pulled up in front of the house and I rushed out of the room to see my mother stumble into the foyer, supported by the nurse and driver. Grandmère instructed them to take Maman up to her room, where they wrapped her in warm blankets to try to stop her shivering. She slept for most of the next week, but at last her fever broke and I was allowed to see her.

"I'm so glad you are getting better, Maman," I said.

She smiled wanly and did not answer.

"Maman, what did you do in Paris?" I asked.

She closed her eyes and said, "I visited old friends."

"Were they glad to see you?"

"Yes," she said. "Very glad."

"I think your mother needs to rest, now," said the nurse, so I gave Maman a hug and went to make her more get-well cards in the nursery.

That night I was awakened by the sound of something trailing past my bedroom door. The little clock by my bed told me it was almost one o'clock in the morning and I got up to see who could be wandering the halls at this time of night.

Once in the passageway with a small candle, I saw two white figures moving toward the North Tower. Pushing down the prickle of fear that went through me (Be brave Lynette, I told myself) I hurried to catch up with them.

When they reached the door that led to the tower, one of the white-clad figures turned around and I saw that it was Grandmère.

"What are you doing here?" she hissed when she spotted me, "Go back to bed."

But I had noticed who was with her. It was Maman and she was drifting slowly down the winding staircase of the North Tower.

"Why is Maman awake in the middle of the night?" I asked.

"She's walking in her sleep," said Grandmère. "Now go to bed. I must follow her and see that she doesn't hurt herself."

"Then I'm coming too. She's my mother," I said stubbornly.

"Fine," snapped Grandmère.

We made our way down the stairs and from below us we could hear my mother singing softly, "In sleep he sang to me, in dreams he came, that voice which calls to me, and speaks my name."

It occurred to me that I had not heard her sing since she came back from Paris, which was odd for Maman, who was always humming some tune or another, even when she was sick. Listening to Maman sing normally gave me great pleasure, but now it only served to make me more afraid.

We followed her to the base of the tower, into a dark storage room filled with old furniture that no one used anymore. Maman wandered over to the corner where there stood a large, old-fashioned mirror. She stopped in front of it, transfixed, and then began to sing again, "I remember there was mist, swirling mist upon a vast glassy lake. There were candles all around and on the lake there was a boat and in the boat there was a man."

She tilted her head and continued, "Who was that shape in the shadows? Whose is the face in the mask?"

Grandmère and I exchanged horrified glances.

"What is she talking about?" I asked.

Grandmère bit her lip and said, "I don't know."

Maman had lifted her hand as if in a caress, when suddenly her face contorted and she bellowed in a strange, low voice that was not her own, "Damn you! You little prying Pandora! You little demon, is this what you wanted to see? Curse you!"

I buried my head in Grandmère's arm, trying to block out the sound of my mother saying these terrible things that were so unlike her, but she continued to shout in that sinister voice. Then the shouting turned to desperate pleading and she said, "Fear can turn to love, you'll learn to see, to find the man behind the monster."

"Oh, she must be mad!" Grandmère whispered, making the sign of the cross.

"Can't we make her stop?" I asked.

"No, it is very dangerous to wake a sleepwalker before they return to bed," said Grandmère.

So we stood there in silence while my mother sobbed wretchedly, until at last she lifted her head and said, still in that strange voice, "Come we must return; those two fools who run my theatre will be missing you."

Then she went up the stairs and back to her room, with Grandmère and I right at her heels. Maman lay down on her big, soft bed and did not move again. My candle cast odd flickering shadows on the wall and I half-expected them to come to life and reveal all this to be a nightmare

"Go to sleep now, child. I will stay with her," said Grandmère, blowing out the candles.

"I'll stay, too," I said, crawling into bed next to Maman. Grandmère looked almost relieved not to be left alone with my mother.

Somehow I managed to fall asleep and when I woke up in the morning I found a small breakfast waiting on a table by the bed, along with fresh clothes.

"Are you hungry, Maman?" I asked, but she was still asleep, so I dressed and ate in silence.

Grandmère came into the room just as I was finishing and said, "Lynette, we need to have a talk."

It was the first time she had ever called me Lynette instead of "the girl" or "the child," so I knew that whatever she had to say was serious.

Out in the hall she checked to make sure that no one else was around and then said in a low voice, "You mustn't speak to anyone about what you saw last night. Your father and I have been keeping the details of your mother's condition a secret. All anyone else knows is that she's ill. You have no idea what would happen if word of her…odd behavior got out. There would be a scandal."

"It's all right Grandmère. I won't tell," I assured her, but I couldn't help wondering what else they might be keeping from me.

Grandmère and I both slept in Maman's room that night and once again we followed her as she went down the steps of the North Tower.

This time she sang in her own voice saying, "Think of me, think of me waking, silent and resigned. Imagine me trying too hard to put you from my mind. Recall those days, look back on all those times, think of the things we'll never do. There will never be a day when I won't think of you."

Her voice ached with longing and regret. Then she whirled around and looked straight through me, as if I were invisible. It made me sick the way her eyes stared at me without seeing.

"My poor Lynette," Maman was saying. "She worries about me, just like her father. It ought to be me worrying about her, but all I can think about is the past. Oh I'm a terrible mother!"

With a cry she began to bang her head against the stone wall.

"Maman, stop!" I shrieked, but she continued to beat her head until Grandmère and I dragged her away.

We laid her out on the floor and I held my candle up to her face to see the damage. Her forehead was a bloody mess and she would not stop thrashing around in Grandmère's arms.

"Oh, do you think she's possessed by a ghost?" I asked.

"There's no such thing as ghosts," said Grandmère and I could tell it was an effort for her to remain so calm. "Now, go tell the footmen to fetch the doctor and bring me the smelling salts at once."

As I raced for the door she added, "Don't tell them everything, Lynette, just that your mother is sick. It wouldn't do for anyone else to know the truth."

I nodded my head, understanding that now I too was expected to lie in order to protect my mother from gossip.

I ran to the servants' quarters and woke up everyone I could. None of them were very happy to have their sleep interrupted so suddenly, but when I told them what the trouble was, they all moved quickly, for they loved my mother too and knew there would be hell to pay if anything happened to her.

Once again, the doctors and nurses seemed to take up permanent residence at the château. Grandmère sent an express to my father, urging him to come home, and three days later he returned very late at night.

I was asleep on the divan in my mother's room when his soft voice woke me.

"I'm sorry I left you, my love."

"Oh Raoul, I don't mean to be such a burden." That was my mother, of course. Still half-asleep, I thought how nice it was to have us all together again.

"Don't say that," said Papa. "All I want to do is take care of you."

"But I should be able to take care of myself. I'm a grown woman. I shouldn't be making life miserable for you and Lynette."

"Lynette and I just want you to get well."

"I don't think I can. My sins weigh on me."

"You've done nothing wrong!" my father insisted.

"I left him alone in the dark, Raoul, all alone. I cannot forget that," said Maman.

"He let you go," my father said.

"Exactly! He let me go, even though it was like tearing out his own heart to do so. Any happiness I have now is thanks to him." Her voice grew even quieter, so that I could barely hear her, "My poor, poor Angel."

I did not understand what they were talking about and yet it filled me with a kind of dread nonetheless. I felt like I was eavesdropping, but if I moved now, they would know that I had heard and I did not want to upset them any further. So I fought the urge to run from the room with my hands over my ears and instead lay there perfectly still, trying not to listen.

"I'll never understood how you can feel pity for such a monster," said Papa.

"He was not born a monster, Raoul. The world is a cruel place and its cruelty twisted him."

There was a pause and for a moment I hoped they had finished talking, but then my father said in a low, shaky voice, "You've never looked at me the way you looked at him that night you sang in his opera."

"I'm sorry," said Maman.

"I don't care, Christine. I love you anyway."

"I love you too Raoul," she sighed.

Usually hearing them say those words gave me comfort, but as the tears slid down my nose, I thought that I had never felt less comforted in my life. Eventually I cried myself to sleep, but Maman and Papa did not notice because they had their own sorrows to occupy them.

There had always been a sadness about my mother and now it threatened to overwhelm her, my father, and the entire household. We all spoke in hushed voices and tiptoed around the house to avoid upsetting her. Sometimes I wanted to shake her and say, "What is wrong with you? Can't you see how unhappy you are making us all?" Then I would feel guilty for being angry with my poor mother, who could not help being sick.

One wet night at the end of March, I was staring out my window at the river, which threatened to overflow its banks in the torrential rain. It seemed that Papa's predictions of a flood were about to come true.

Then the nurse appeared at the door saying, "Your mother is asking for you, miss."

I trotted after her into my mother's gold paneled suite. She lay propped up on her pillows, her face drawn and her eyes weary.

"Hello, Lynette," she said.

"Hello, Maman. How are you feeling tonight?" I asked.

"I'm fine," she said. "I wanted to see you."

I climbed up next to her and she pulled me into an embrace, holding me tightly for several minutes.

"You are going to be all right. I know you're going to be all right," she said, as she lay back against the pillows.

"Of course, Maman. Don't worry about me," I said. Something about her tone made me uneasy.

"I hope that someday you will understand."

"Understand what?" I asked, but she had shut her eyes.

"I'm so tired," she murmured.

"I'll let you go to sleep then," I said. "Goodnight Maman." I kissed her gently on the forehead.

"Goodnight, darling. I love you very, very much," she said.

"I love you too," I replied and then I returned to my room, wondering why I felt so scared to leave her.

The next morning I went downstairs to find the entire house in an uproar. The servants huddled together in small groups in the hallway, muttering to each other and some of them gave me oddly furtive looks as I made my way into the dining room.

"How could she have gotten out without anyone seeing?" my father was asking. He sat at his usual place at the head of the table and his toast had a single bite taken out of it, as if he had been interrupted before getting a good start on his breakfast.

"I don't know," said the frightened looking nurse. "She was far too weak to move, I tell you. I've never been more shocked than when I found her bed empty this morning. I only stepped out for ten minutes to make her tea!"

That's when I realized they were talking about Maman. A knot formed in my stomach.

"Are you saying she was abducted?" demanded Papa. He had not yet noticed that I was in the room.

I saw Grandmère at the far end of the table, her head in her hands. I took a seat next to her and she reached out to give my shoulder a squeeze.

"Don't fret, child," she said quietly. "Your father sent a man to fetch the police and a dozen others to search the grounds. He's going to go out himself, once he's finished questioning the nurse. They'll find her. She can't have gone very far."

Suddenly, a soaking wet man burst in on us. I recognized him as one of the local farmers who rented land from my father. His clothes dripped onto the red carpet and his eyes were wild. We all turned to stare at him as he stood framed in the doorway.

"The Vicomtesse is dead!" he exclaimed.