The comment was ridiculous. The Angel had always been the one with power. It was he who commanded her, who instructed and guided her. Then she thought of that final evening, how he had railed at her and pleaded. She had been willing to stay with him, and that had been enough. That had evidently been all he wanted, for he had let her go. It was painful to think about, even still, that confusion of rage, fear, sadness, and desire. Mme. Giry left her to her thoughts with a brief pat on the shoulder.
With too many thoughts crowding her head, she stood to look about the room. It was not an elegant room, but it was comfortable, with three chairs arranged around the hearth just as if many conversations were held there—quiet, calm conversations, for the chairs were set close. She went to the desk under the window, where the Angel had been sitting the night before. It was strangely plain, with just one drawer, and tall for a desk. Inside the drawer was a stack of quills, mostly uncut, and a small penknife. The knife was fairly new, but already there were smudges of ink on the handle, which made her smile. Candle drippings littered one corner of the table, as well of a line of drops leading from the inkwell, as if he had been writing too quickly to pay attention. She remembered the opulent untidiness of his rooms under the Opéra and had to smile again. She sat in the chair—plain, uncomfortable, without even a cushion.
What was it she had called him that night? "Pitiful creature of darkness." She had been more right than she knew. There was still so much confusion. That Raoul had known the whole story and not told her was painful. But when she thought of how he might have told her, she shook her head. He would have had no patience for an abused child, for a lifetime of isolation. She tried to imagine it. Her childhood had been sad after her father died, and she had often been lonely and felt like an outsider, but that could be nothing compared with the misery and loneliness of the Angel, down in his catacombs.
"Perhaps," she thought, turning over in her hand a battered and ink-stained quill, "that was what drew him to me."
She had never thought of it before, having always assumed that he was some semi-mystical creature sent from Heaven. It made sense. They had sought comfort in one another. It's just that things went terribly wrong.
Christine thought back to the first time he had ever spoken to her. She had been kneeling in front of the angel window, pleading with her father to send the Angel of Music to her as he had promised, when a beautiful voice rang out, "Child, I am here." She smiled at her young self. She had been so determined, in her desperation, that her father would reach to her from beyond death. She had been so unhappy, amid strangers and with her broken French, suddenly spending every day dancing her child's body into exhaustion. She had wanted to be rescued. Her Papa had always saved her from fear and harm—from bees, from strangers, from dark things in the night. Surely death would make no difference in that. He was Papa. That he would never save her again had been too much to bear.
Of course, the voice startled her. She had screamed in fright and been afraid to return for the better part of a week. Getting wishes could be frightening, she discovered. Looking back, she realized how inattentive the Angel was for the first couple of years when she had prattled to him about her girlish woes. Yet he had always been there for her. Any time that the conversation strayed from music, responses had been sparse indeed, but she had learned to become aware of his presence, and she had taken comfort in it, even when he had said nothing. Those meetings in the chapel had been so precious to her. She realized that, without them, she would likely have made more of an effort to make friends in the ballet corps. Little girls with no manners were not as interesting as angels. As she had grown, she had spoken to him less of her daily life and troubles, but she had never questioned that he knew anyway. That he was everywhere was understood, and it was mostly a comfort.
She thought of how much time it had been. Papa had died when she was seven; it was several months later that he first spoke to her. Ten full years, then of friendship—a strange friendship, certainly, made up of songs, of scales and arpeggios, rather than conversations. And just over a year of strangeness. Carlotta had been having little "accidents" for a couple of years before that, but they had been limited to minor frights and irritations. It was just in that one year. He had become more demanding and strict, had talked more frequently of her impending stardom. What had it been that triggered the change? Of course it was love. He had fallen in love with her but had had no idea how to express it. All he knew were loneliness and pain. He had behaved stupidly, but she considered that he simply knew no better.
It was another piece of the puzzle, but it wasn't enough. Never mind about Raoul. Never mind about this astonishing friendship between the Angel and Mme. Giry. She wanted to know about this supposed madness that had driven him to murder. She wanted to know whether she was right—that his love for her had driven him to such desperation. Most important, she wanted to know why he had let her go.
She sighed. It had been one thing to mourn him and to mourn her misunderstood blossoming of desire when he had been dead. To think that he was alive and had changed his mind created a hollow ache in her chest. What if she had hurt him too badly? What if recovering from his madness meant that he had recovered from loving her? Christine shook her head.
"Now I'm going mad," she said. She was thinking as if she wanted him to love her. Could that even be? Surely there was too much pain between them, too much horror. It was as if there were two of her—the half that missed her friend and protector and the half that wanted to rage at him for his cruelty, for taking away her home and livelihood, for ruining her dreams in the most horrible betrayal. Then there was another part—a small, secret part, one she didn't want to acknowledge—that remembered the fire of his kiss and cared not at all for circumstances or feelings but wanted only more of him, his mouth on hers and the circle of his arms blocking out the world.
She moaned to herself and put her face into her hands.