Author's Note: Salut to all. As stated in the nine other parts of this fic, the characters with whom you are familiar do not belong to me.
The Patron of the Opera – Chapter Eight
Erik remained careful and alert throughout the months after the gala as he kept watch for any sign of the shadow man that had invaded his domain. As an inevitable result, he realized exactly how long Lady O'Connor worked on the preparations for her opera.
Moved with curiosity, he had watched the Irishwoman silently for the weeks after her opening performance from the mirror in her dressing room. He knew that both she and William had been besieged with offers from that management to increase the run of the production from the one week to three, leaving no break between the closing of 'Czarina Catrina' and the opening of 'Aida'. Unexpectedly, neither Rose nor William was happy with this turn of events and had argued for the terms of the original contract. Eventually they had compromised that it would run for two weeks instead of one, and so Rose had spent a great deal of time drawing up the contracts and making the arrangements for the changes.
The result of their hesitance to accept an extended run of their production caused much speculation with the patrons and employees of the opera. Rumors spread like wildfire throughout society; the patrons claimed that it was due to financial difficulties on William's behalf and critics stated that it might be due to the mediocrity of the piece even after its triumph at the gala. The costume mistress announced that it was due to Rose's failing health and the ballet rats were convinced that it was the result of Rose and William's impending nuptials.
There is often some truth to rumors and while Erik could see that there was no truth to the critics' speculations and that according to the opera's coffers, William's finances were experiencing no difficulties, the most truth laid in the theory of the costume mistress.
Rose often worked alone in her dressing room late into the night. Surrounded by the opera score, she made adjustments so that it would be performed as perfectly as possible by the French artists. Erik had watched her stay overnight in her room working for hours with an oil lamp and a bottle of wine at her side; the levels of liquid in both disappearing as the night wore until she finally fell asleep with her head on the worn manuscripts.
On other nights, she would take sips from a flask that she kept well hidden in the top drawer of her bureau; on those nights she fell asleep much faster than with the wine. By day, she maintained an active and vivacious lifestyle as she attended to the needs of artists and patrons alike. By night, she was plagued with nightmares and horrible spells of night sweats and coughing. Her health was obviously declining as she continued to work and she took great pains to hide this from William's concerned eyes.
Erik pretended not to be concerned for the woman; he did not know her and did not feel any necessity to worry himself with her problems. However, a sick feeling in his stomach prompted him to observe her; it was as though a sixth sense had made him finely tuned to the happenings in her life.
The first snowfall of the season found many Parisians out and about on the freezing December morning bustling around in their furs and wraps as they tried to obtain the best presents and trimmings for the upcoming holidays. The entire city was alive with festive cheer and the Opera Garnier was no exception. Everyone, from the great diva to the janitors, sang carols as they went about their jobs and relished in the festive atmosphere of their fellow man. Everyone, that is, except the resident Opera Ghost.
Christmas had never been Erik's favorite time of the year and he had always treated the day as he would any other. Events this year would not lead him to reevaluate his view on the holiday.
It was decided that after the final runs of Faust that a holiday concert would be held in celebration of Christmas. The annual masquerade ball would then be held a week later in honor of the New Year. The concert was an afterthought that was inspired by the desires of both Carlotta and Rose; Carlotta never passed up an opportunity for the limelight and Rose was anxious to get more publicity for 'Czarina Catrina' in the three weeks before opening night. As it had not been professionally arranged or planned by the management, the concert was hastily thrown together by all those willing to donate their time and energy. The proceeds of the concert would benefit the orphans of Paris and in response to this charitable cause, many patrons were willing to donate heavy sums to the coffers of the opera house as well.
The night chosen for this impromptu performance was December 24th and the pieces to be performed would be selected at the discretion of the M. Reyer. No formal rehearsals were held except for a very brief meeting between Rose, Carlotta, Piangi, and the bass who had played Sasastro in 'La Flute Enchantée'. Apparently, the quartet had something hidden up their sleeves for the performance and Erik had to confess that he was quite interested in the product of Rose and Carlotta's mutual efforts.
The two women had completely lost all of their former hostility for each other and regarded each other with a great deal of respect. Erik, as well as the rest of the opera company, knew how indebted Carlotta was to Rose for the silencing of the critics at the gala night. Rose's motives were much less transparent to her colleagues, but she had announced that Carlotta would be playing the role of the czarina at the opening of her opera; to Erik, it was apparent that Rose was hoping that Carlotta's name would bring more support for her opera.
The night of the concert arrived and Erik hid himself once again in the confines of Box Five. The orchestra began by performing a few mundane carols as the ballet pranced about the stage, each girl dressed in festive colors. The audience was delighted with this mundane spectacle and the mistakes of the both the dancers and orchestra went without comment from those who typically were never too slow to rip apart the slightest error in an operatic performance. Bored to tears, Erik reclined in his seat and mused about the present state of affairs.
'Honestly, if only one composer in the world would write a Christmas ballet with passable music, he'd be immortalized by that piece forever!'
Several soloists, both vocal and instrumental, were featured as they too continued with the tuneless songs of the season. Intermission came and went. Again, the orchestra continued to play and the audience clapped dutifully at the end of each piece.
The last movement was the only part which was in any way entertaining. Vocal selections from several carols and the Hallelujah chorus of Handel's Messiah were performed by a quartet featuring Carlotta, Piangi, Rose, and Savinov, the bass vocalist, accompanied by the orchestra of the Opera. Carlotta entered with Piangi on her arm; both were dressed in obscenely vibrant red satin garments. Carlotta wore bright red poinsettias in her unnatural red hair and Piangi wore them in the buttonhole of his tuxedo. Rose entered on the arm of Savinov; he was dressed in the standard black of the time and she wore a dark green silk gown on which she had also pinned poinsettias. In her hair, she had managed to craft a simple crown of holly and the red berries and green leaves stood out attractively from her auburn coiffure. The haunted look in her eyes that had taken hold in the prior weeks was gone and a bright twinkle had taken its place as she sang under the glow of the gas lamps of the auditorium. Where Carlotta's ensemble was painful to look at, Rose's was so simply elegant that she could be easily mistaken for one of the beautiful fabled spirits of Christmas.
They opened with a simple rendition of 'Deck the Halls' and continued through 'We Three Kings', 'I Saw Three Ships', and 'Silent Night' before Rose moved to the grand piano on the stage. She treated the audience to two simple pieces of her own composition, one a duet for bass and tenor and the other a soprano solo which featured the other vocalists. When the applause ended for the second piece, she played an elaborately scored piano solo which she had also composed. Watching her from Box Five, Erik saw how passionately she played; she appeared to be completely unaware of the audience and lost in a musical world of her own making. As the tempo decreased and the song came to an end, she came out of her trance-like state and turned to the conductor of the orchestra. She nodded to him and he signaled the brass to play an opening fanfare to Handel's 'Messiah'. As the fanfare continued, several other members of the opera chorus filed in behind the soloists, all dressed in the white robes that were used for the choir of angels in the runs of Faust. The opening notes of the piece sounded and with a nod to the conductors of both ensembles, Rose led them in a lively rendition of 'Hallelujah'.
While nowhere near as grand as the finale to 'Czarina Catrina', the chorus was still rewarded with the applause of the Parisian patrons. Bows were taken and Erik stood and moved to return to his home. However, looking out across the auditorium one last time provided him a view of a shadow, too obscure to be made out clearly, but carefully hidden in the shadows of Box Four on the second tier. He watched the shadow's movements carefully from his place across the theater and saw that its gaze was focused on the soloists taking their bows. When they rose and exited the stage, the figure turned toward Box Five for a brief moment and then disappeared into the dark shadows of the theater.
Using the passages which he had personally designed, Erik made to follow this figure, but despite his best efforts he was unable to locate the mysterious being. It was safe to say that Erik had never been more cautious on his route back to his lair for fear of discovery.
The Christmas holidays passed by in a blur and many arrangements were being made in anticipation of the opening of 'Czarina Catrina'. Erik was able to dismiss his feelings of unease and impending doom until the events of one of the late evenings following the holiday.
Two evenings after the Christmas performance, Rose opted to stay the night in order to get everything finalized for the opening night before the New Year celebrations. Erik had watched her briefly from the mirror as she drank from her flask, became disinterested with the boring events, and had gone on a short walk of his theater. On his way back to his lair, he had walked past the mirror again only to find that Rose was not in her usual place. Curiosity won over his better judgment and he began to stalk the passages of the opera in search of her.
He finally found her in the auditorium at the piano which had been used in the earlier chorus practice. She was playing Bach at the moment, but switched to Vivaldi and finally began playing one of the arias from 'Czarina Catrina'. Before tonight, Erik had never heard her play with the feelings and emotions that she put into the piece. Her performance at the concert did not accurately reflect her abilities; she was easily one of the best pianists he had ever heard. She deftly improvised the passages and moved her upper body in time with the music as her hands flew effortlessly across the ivory keys. Erik was completely entranced as he sat back in the shadows near the stage and listened as she played without pause for over an hour.
A creak echoed throughout the auditorium which roused Erik from his musings; Rose, however, kept playing without notice. His gold eyes scanned the auditorium, looking for the source of the sound. There was nothing amiss, yet Erik felt uneasy and was unwilling to move from the shadows to examine it further.
However, thoughts of discovery were quickly dispersed as Rose's hands froze on the keyboard. The sudden silence lasted only a second and was broken by the sound of violent coughing; Rose now bent over the keyboard as the coughs ripped their way from her chest. She reached over to the pile of music at her side and grasped at the small silver flask which she brought to her lips, managing to take a few sips of its contents before breaking into another fit. She stood hastily, apparently trying to get back to her dressing room. However, she only managed to get a few steps from the piano before she was overcome by dizziness and collapsed to the ground.
Erik stood immediately and would have walked over to assist her, not willing to allow the poor woman to spend the night unconscious on the ground. However, a movement from the opposite side of the stage alerted him to another's presence in the auditorium.
A shadow limped carefully and quietly out to the stage and slowly knelt down to the fallen figure. In the dim lighting of the auditorium, Erik was able to discern that the figure was attired in the same tattered opera cloak and garments that had been worn the night of the gala performance by the man who had invaded the sanctity of his box. The figure slowly and painfully gathered the fallen woman in its arms and slowly began to limp in the direction of her dressing room. It staggered right past the corner where Erik hid and spared a glance in the direction, but continued to painfully drag himself and his burden through the hallways of the opera.
Not willing to have any crimes committed in his domain if he could avoid it, Erik followed the two for he refused to allow this woman to be attended by an unknown specter. The figure had a very difficult time with the door to her room and actually had to lay her unconscious body carefully on the ground as he used both hands to turn the handle. He picked her up and laid her gently down on her chaise. Tucking a thin blanket around her, the figure stroked the line of her chin with a leather gloved hand.
Erik stationed himself behind the mirror and silently watched as the man attended to Rose's unconscious form. The man bathed her temples with scented water from her washbasin and brushed back the stray curls that had fallen into her face. But when he began to undo the buttons to her bodice, Erik found that he could contain himself no longer.
Before the fourth button had even been touched, the mirror had spun on its axis and Erik had forced the intruder up against the wall of the room.
He shook the man's shoulders violently and whispered harshly "Who in Hell's name are you?! Tell me now who you are or you will not escape from my opera alive. I will not have a woman harmed by the likes of you!"
The man visibly cringed away from the Opera Ghost's wrath before he gained as much composure as he could under the circumstances and focused his dark eyes on the blazing gimlets before him. In a small, strained voice, he replied in heavily accented French "The likes of me? I suppose that I am a loathsome creature, one that a woman like her must be protected from. But I would never harm her...I am incapable of doing so. I find that I am incapable of doing many things at the present..."
"Do not dodge my question! Who are you?!" Erik spat, his grip on the other man tightening by the second.
"You have no reason to threaten me, monsieur. How could I harm her when I love her? When I have loved her for years and could never possibly stop loving her?" The man whispered, his gaze returning to the woman lying on the chaise.
Banging the man's head against the wall, Erik asked sharply "What on earth are you talking about?"
"Let's just say that I knew her in another life, monsieur. Surely a ghost such as yourself is familiar with the concept of reincarnation!"
"I am not a patient man, monsieur. I demand an answer! Who are you?!"
"Nobody, sir. I am nobody. Nobody to be concerned with..."
In response, Erik grabbed the man by his collar and trapped him against the wall, snarling as his grip on the man's throat tightened.
"Now, I demand an answer or I will kill you now. You will find that I have great experience in that area of expertise..."
His captive's gaze fell once again on the unconscious form of Lady O'Connor and he whispered in a broken voice "Go ahead...kill me now, Monsieur le Fantome...please...I beg of you...it would be a mercy..."
Again, Erik hit the man's head against the wall to in order to reinforce his threat. The movement caused the cowl of the tattered cloak to fall and Erik found himself mask to mask with this unknown intruder. The man had a roughly sewn brown leather mask that covered all of his face except for the eyes and an opening for the mouth. For the first time in his life, Erik was aware of the intense curiosity that was inspired by a simple piece of leather covering.
The eyes behind the mask were dark and intense with emotion; at the moment, only extreme sorrow and pain were reflected in the gaze. He unconsciously loosened his grip on the man's neck and shoulders and when he did so, a small gold locket dislodged itself from the folds of the man's collar.
"They ascertained that all effects were returned to me but a locket which I had given him as an engagement gift..".
Rose's words echoed through his mind and removing his hand from the man's shoulder, Erik grasped the locket and studied it. The man looked down and gasped and struggled against the vice-like grip on his neck as he tried to free himself.
"Monsieur, no! Please let that be! Please! I beg of you!"
But Erik had already read the inscription engraved on the front of the locket and had seen the two line portraits inside. He released his hold on the other's neck and stepped back, seeing this man in a new light.
The other masked man remained pressed against the wall as he cradled his masked face in his gloved hands.
"Monsieur, please understand...she cannot know that I'm here." He begged, his voice muffled by the leather of his mask and gloves.
"I beg of you, please understand…she cannot know…she must not know…"
A/N: Well, I suppose this just about sums it up for all of you who I left hanging on this! The mysterious stranger is revealed (at least I hope you consider him revealed) and I'm sure that many of you can now figure out where I'm heading with this.
I apologize for my lack of updates; my life has been extremely hectic as of late thanks to problems with my semester, my apartment, my car, and with my health. At least nobody in the family has died yet…however the one family car was stolen last week so we have lost one mechanical member of our family! I'm hoping for everything to calm down after two weeks, but one never can be sure!
I would also like to apologize for the fact that I will not be acknowledging reviewers individually in this chapter; I've done so up until this point but since I just want to get this chapter up and posted to prove that I am still alive, I haven't taken the time to thank you each for your praise and advice. I will continue to do so, especially with this piece, in further chapters when things aren't such a mess at home. So for all of you who have reviewed for me, from my long-time reviewers to the newest phan phiction phan, thank you very much for taking the time to give me your input. It is greatly appreciated.
Many reviewers and private emails mentioned similarities between my story and the Pot and yes, they are intentional. You will hopefully notice more similarities as the story progresses…however, be forewarned that I do not intend on a similar ending.
Many reviewers also seem to be missing the literary reference that I had mentioned in an earlier chapter. I suppose that it was not as obvious as I thought it would be (normally, I am oblivious to a literary reference and stupidly assumed that everyone would catch this one in seconds since I knew of it and was comparing all of you against myself…this only goes to prove that I really do read weird stuff!) but I have no intention nor need to divulge it now. If you had caught it, you would've anticipated the events of this chapter but if you didn't find it, you've already got all the info you need at this point. At any rate, I promise to make sure that I include the full text of the literary reference as an Epilogue to this piece; some of you might enjoy it even though it's just about as depressing as the ending I'm intending.
Fans of 'How Hungry' are going to hate me. You probably already hate me as it is for leaving you with such a cliffhanger, much less nearly a month late in updates. There is one more chapter that will end the story for you but thanks to an evil ftp account, all that I had written for it has been lost to the black hole that is cyberspace. I basically have half of what I originally wrote and so the update will have to be postponed until a bit later since I don't want to disappoint anyone with a rushed ending.
Thanks for all who sent reviews or emails with words of encouragement for the end of the semester; emails are always nice to receive and it is a comfort to know that some people in the world are supportive!