Chapter Twenty-four
The next morning, Sam found his friend still slumped over the piano. The mask lay on the floor where he had thrown it.
"Erik? It's nine o'clock. You would want anyone to..."
He was going to say "see you like this," but realized Erik might take those words the wrong way. His friend was in a sorry state and Sam almost regretted letting Christine wait to see him.
Erik straightened up, one hand covering his face. That lack of trust pained Sam. He knew the truth, he had seen what the Germans had done to Erik. He had sought out a doctor who had been willing to treat his injuries in secret after his escape. He had tended to Erik during weeks of pain and fever, heard him calling Christine's name over and over in his delirium.
Sam knew the worst of it, but Erik still kept his features hidden from him.
He picked up the mask and laid it on the piano.
"Thank you, Sam," Erik said as he turned his back on him and pressed the mask onto his face.
As Erik went up the steps that led to his office and the apartment above, Sam called after him.
"I'll bring some coffee up for you. You seem as if you could use it."
When Sam returrned with the hot, strong coffee, Erik had changed from the rumpled clothing of the previous evening and was just knotting his gray and green silk tie.
Taking the coffee from Sam, he looked out the window and saw Christine leaving the hotel with her companion of the previous evening.
Fool...what woman wouldn't exchange a dead lover for a living husband..a hideous ghost for a handsome boy.
Raoul walked with Christine as far as the bazaar before going in search of the Fantasie and Philippe.
"I shall see you back at the hotel after lunch," he said as he kissed her cheek and left her in the crowded market.
For the better part of an hour, she wandered through the stalls full of exotic flowers, heady perfumes, rich spices, and beautiful fabrics.
She knew she should worry for her husband now. There was always danger in a rendezvous like that, even more so with Nazis present in Casablanca.
But she could not tear her mind from her reunion...her sad confrontation with Erik.
I won't give up on him...I will try and try...I will go back to him.
For now, she had to keep up the facade of being just a lady shopping in the bazaar. She paused at a stand selling shawls and scarves.
She picked up a large shawl, a generous rectangle of sheer ivory silk mottled with rich tones of gold and russet. Roses were scattered over the delicate fabric, embroidered in coppery thread.
"Ah, Madame has fine taste," the stand's proprieter said with a little bow, "very fine tast indeed."
As she asked the seller his price, she sensed someone standing near her...another customer, no doubt.
Shaking her head at the too-high price of the shawl, she stepped aside a little to make room at the table for the newcomer.
"I would be willing to give Madame a discount of, perhaps, ten francs," the seller was saying as she started to put the shawl down.
"Good morning, Christine," she heard a quiet voice say.
She turned to find that it was Erik who stood beside her.
He wore a finely tailored gray suit and his face remained covered by that frowning mask. She let her eyes meet his and found them without expression...not blank, but totally with emotion.
Before she could answer him, the stall owner broke into a bright, toothy grin.
"Ah, ah! So the lovely lady is a friend of Monsier Erik!"
He then eagerly quoted her an absurdly low price for the shawl, but she did not hear him. Her eyes...all of attention was fixed on Erik. Inspector Giry had implied that he was a sort of reclusive. She never expected to see him here beside her in the market.
He looked away from her, though, and picked up a corner of the shawl to read the original price scrawled on a little paper tage.
He handed the seller the full amount without the customary bargaining. As the man folded the shawl and wrapped it in tissue paper, Erik returned his calm gaze to Christine.
"Madame, I am sorry about last night. I shouldn't have treated you so roughly."
"I am the one who should apologize to you, Erik. Those things I said when you made me...when I left you...I shouldn't said them."
The man handed the parcel to Erik with a bow and profuse expression of gratitude. But Erik seemed to have forgotten the man's existence as he laid the wrapped shawl in Christine's hands.