A/N: As a bit of trivia, the American Ambulance (temporary hospital) was fairly prominent; it was set up with equipment left over from the 1867 Exhibition and boasted some of the most advanced surgical care of the period, which, sadly, meant that the overall death rates were more like 20% instead of 50-60% for other Parisian ambulances.
Chapter 36 — Homecoming
Behind the tents of the American Ambulance ran a deep ditch, within which a single furnace was now lit, piping warm air to the officers' tent to protect its lone occupant from the evening chill. The ditch itself was new, its walls of freshly dug clay still untouched by rainfall, smelling only of living tree roots. It was not at all uncomfortable. The side of the furnace gave off a dry heat, and by some little experimentation Erik contrived to find a position that allowed him to stay near it, his back against one earthen wall and his legs braced against a rock in the wall opposite. It was as good a place as any for the Opera Ghost's homecoming, he thought: a ditch beneath what had been the most glamorous part of Paris. He waited for the blue dusk to become nighttime.
Inside the tent, the Vicomte was finally, mercifully quiet. The American surgeon who had come earlier mentioned opium; Erik wholeheartedly approved. Relieved at last of the Vicomte's low, monotonous hum of pain that had been his constant accompaniment for the past week, he revelled in being able to hear again all the usual small sounds of the world: the crackle of the fire in the furnace, the distant voices, the calls of birds going to roost in the gardens that bordered the avenue. His own breathing. He listened for the Vicomte's laboured breathing, but could not make it out at this distance. That was only to be expected. He refused to think of what it would mean if Chagny did not survive this last part of the journey. How could he return to bring Christine nothing but horror?
But Christ, it stank here. Or rather, Erik corrected himself, he stank. He had managed to wash out his muddy and bloodstained shirt and trousers once, sloshing them in a creek somewhere along the way, but that must have been three, perhaps four days ago. His boots he did not even attempt to remove, lest the ruined leather fall apart in the process and he should be left to cross the country barefoot. In any case there had been no time for it, not if they were to keep in front of the steel teeth of the Prussian advance, snapping at their heels. The wagon he had commandeered from one of the abandoned houses in Bazeilles had not been built for speed, any more than the poor horse harnessed to it could manage anything more rapid than a walk. And so they blundered through day after identical day, the Vicomte alternately lucid and feverish on his stretcher in the back, Erik cursing uselessly on the box as he tried to guide the horse along unfamiliar roads.
He had scant recollection of that final morning of the battle, or of his own ignominious return. When he tried, he saw only fragmented images, slaughterhouse grotesques of dying men that morphed into ancient memories of freak shows. He did remember, much later, his feet kicking apart the burnt remnants of carpets and the twisted furniture, the crunch of plaster fallen from the bullet holes in the walls, the heavy thud of the trapdoor and then finally, the terrified people emerging, rising from their grave…
His heart had hammered until he thought he would grow deaf with the noise of his own fear. He could not have told whether these survivors were only phantoms of his imagination: did he dream the ragged couple and their maid emerging into the destruction? Were they all in fact lying dead in the godforsaken attic, in their last, futile defence?
"They've gone," muttered Egrot, or his ghost, as if he did not quite understand how the Prussians and Bavarians could have passed through and vanished so completely. "We owe our lives to your cellar..."
His wife, real or imagined, just stood there in the middle of the ravaged kitchen, her shoulders hunched. Erik thought he heard her say, "He's downstairs. Your friend."
In a kind of stupor, he found himself descending the ladder into the earth. In the inner cellar, he found the body, supine on a mat of empty potato sacks, a fresh bandage, hideously white, shrouding one thigh. The eyes sunken and shut.
Erik leaned down, listening for breathing...
Chagny's fist slammed into his jaw, sickening in its violence. Erik rocked back with the force of the blow and the Vicomte grabbed at his shoulder to stand, his body lurching alarmingly on his bad leg. He reeked of sweat and blood, too close; Erik gagged and knew without a doubt this was real.
He was alive. They were all alive. The world started to spin away, but the Vicomte was still holding on to his shoulder - and all at once Erik felt everything reverse, so that he was the one lurching down to steady himself.
"You coward," the Vicomte said viciously, throwing him off. "They waited. You swore you'd protect them."
"Did I?" Erik snarled, "Then just who do you think built this cellar?"
The Vicomte's confusion was suddenly the most comical thing he had ever seen. Erik laughed and laughed, until it hurt to breathe, until Egrot returned and together they managed to get the Vicomte, shuddering with pain, out into the daylight.
It ceased to be funny when he realised Chagny intended to leave.
"But you mustn't, they'll take you prisoner!" exclaimed Egrot, while his wife and even the maid added their voices to the hubbub of objection:
"Come, monsieur," the girl cajoled, clutching the Vicomte's sleeve, "Come and lie down. You mustn't exert yourself now."
Erik saw how she looked at him. A hero.
"If you have a death wish," he said, "I would be pleased to oblige you."
Chagny had rounded on him: "They're coming. Don't you get it? They're heading for Paris."
"And you intend to stop them?"
He did not reply, but only continued to glare at Erik, in challenge.
"I owe you nothing," Erik had said, in response to the unspoken demand. "I saved your life, Vicomte. It would be the height of rudeness to throw it away now."
"I'm going to Paris, Andersson."
"Then you're going to die."
"Fine. You can bury me."
When Erik said nothing, the Vicomte slowly stretched out a hand, and held it, waiting. "You're wasting time. I can't ride," he glanced at his bandaged thigh, "and without me, you do not know the way. If we fall behind the Prussian lines, we're through."
"You're raving," Erik said, not moving. After a long moment, the Vicomte lowered his hand.
"They mean to surround the city," he said, his voice dull. He glanced through the broken window, to the shelled ruins beyond the back garden. "They have cannon. If they do…"
He did not speak Christine's name. Erik was glad of it, but the decision had been made all the same.
"You said it yourself, you cannot ride. Do you propose we fly there?"
"Get a wagon," Egrot butted in, helpfully. "If you mark it with the Red Cross, they will let you pass, they must, even if you cross their lines."
The Vicomte thanked him with careful courtesy — then, as though relieved of the need to remain conscious, folded down to the floor like a carcass of meat, and was still.
Damn him, Erik thought, but he was right. They had wasted too many hours already.
It took several hours more to find a wagon and horse, secure the stretcher and load the provisions. The Vicomte, though revived, was too weak to be useful and within an hour he was asleep on the stretcher, tossing and turning in the narrow wagon.
Despite her husband's fretting, Madame Egrot had the maid fill the wagon with what little food had remained unspoiled, carefully wrapping their share of potatoes and bread and apples, oats for the horse, matches, and more than their share of wine.
"He will need this," she had said to Erik, tapping one of the bottles and nodding in Raoul's direction. "It is the fever now, and you must know that is bad news. Very bad."
She, too, was right. By the following day, the Vicomte could no longer bear to put weight on the wounded leg. Erik had forced him to wash the wound out again, with boiled water and wine, then repeated the whole thing himself the following day, when the Vicomte could not manage. A foul, nauseating task, but it was not enough. The wound had started to suppurate.
Outside the ambulance tent, on the edge of the gaslit evening, Erik listened for the sound of the Vicomte's breathing, but heard only the bells, ringing for curfew.
Being out after curfew meant arrest; still, Erik had observed enough National Guard patrols since sundown to know they were more interested in the nearby bar than in chasing shadows. He waited until full dark, then slid among the tents, heading back to the boulevards and from there to the smaller, unlit, streets.
Here was home, here in the night, in the welcoming shadows that hid the ugliness of military preparations, in the old silhouettes of gargoyles and roofs. He had no fear of discovery, not here. For a perfect moment, his ragged bandage was a smooth theatre mask, his clothing a suit of the deepest, richest black. The flow of his cloak was music.
The Opéra stood silent, exactly as he has left it. Erik found the broken grille, lifted it free, and slipped into the passageway below.
"Mrrreoww!"
He stifled a curse as his boots hit something soft; a stray cat. It hissed, yellow eyes lambert below him, before vanishing soundlessly into the gloom. Erik stood very still, trying to gather his thoughts in the musty dark. He waited for his own eyes to adjust. Which way? The chapel, then onward to the spiral stairwell, then down, down, down… Yes, of course. He had not forgotten his own old haunts.
And yet, had the passages always been so foul? The deeper he went, the more repellent was the stench of damp and decay. The walls were slimy with algae, the stairs slippery as-
"Hell!.."
Very cautiously, Erik stepped back from the trapdoor that had sprung open under him, a hair's breadth from sending him down into his own water-filled lock. Perfect. Now this would have made a fitting punishment for his hubris. His chest rose and fell, belatedly aware of the danger.
With infinitely more care he made his way down the remaining turns of the stairs, to what had once been his own backstage, the obverse of the lair behind curtains and screens. He was gratified to see the mob had not found its way this far; the rotting drapes were still in place, the keyboard of the organ stood open but whole, and even the mannequin that had borne Christine's face remained discarded in its corner, unseen.
Erik felt his legs buckling and sat down before he could fall. This was it, at last. He had dreamed of coming here one day, not like this, but triumphant, indifferent, whole. "Take the lot away," he would have said to the army of workmen at his command, ready for their architect's orders. Other times he had dreamed only of the lake, of floating through the cold green water.
The reality was smaller than those dreams, and somehow pathetic. What was it Christine had said then, in the midst of his crazed antics… Pitiful. Yes, pitiful is what it now seemed. The mouldy velvet, the fake gold leaf and greasepaint and melted candles. Only the organ was still beautiful, truly beautiful without any effort at glamour. But that was a danger greater than all the traps and triggers combined; Erik did not dare look too long. He felt the weight of Christine's ring in his pocket, steadying himself.
Avoiding the organ, he went to the lake to wash as best he could, then found the boxes of props and costume cases hidden backstage. He threw them open one after the other, pulling out at random whatever seemed least damaged by the pervasive mould. Narrow fitting trousers and morning-coat — had these things ever truly looked the way he had imagined they did?
Erik studied his reflection in the sole remaining mirror that had cracked without shattering. Either his delusion had been greater than he might have supposed, or he had changed, irrevocably, in the short months outside the confines of this place. This costume had been made for a different man: his own shoulders were broader than the suit permitted, uncomfortable in the rigid seams; the trouser legs bunched above calves where there were new knots of muscle he had never noticed before, muscles that spoke of miles walked outside. At least the shirt still fit, and the boots were solid and far more comfortable than what he had been wearing.
He hesitated on the masks. The bandage, filthy beyond all hope, could no longer serve, but Erik could not bring himself to replace it with any of the collection of the Phantom's masks, leather or papier mâché or porcelain, white or black or corpse grey. They were props from a forgotten drama, a role in which he would be badly miscast.
He chose instead another shirt, ripped a panel from the side and tied that on. The effect was ugly, but at least it was not a lie. He was not returning to Christine as an architect; that dream lay stillborn in Sedan. But he had brought her Vicomte this far, dragged him alive from hell all the way to Paris, and damn it, he would see this through.
He allowed himself one final glance back. Then he ran.
o o o
"What's happened to all our ink?"
"Oh," Meg looked up as Christine poked her head around the bedroom door. "Come on in. Sorry, that was me. Mine was out." She shuffled across on the bed, where she was sitting cross-legged, surrounded by stacks of fat books, and passed Christine the half-empty ink bottle.
Christine looked curiously at the volumes. "Dictionaries?"
"Art catalogues." Meg riffled through the nearest one to show her the ruled pages and careful notes. "Well, inventories. They're taking whatever they can out to Le Havre, but the paintings need labels and descriptions and such, it's getting urgent. Monsieur de Gas asked if I would help. It's not much money, but it is interesting, going behind the scenes."
Christine eyed the number of catalogues. "You did all those?"
Meg laughed. "No, of course not. There's half a hundred people still at the Louvre, finishing the packing. I just did some today, and I'm supposed to check the copies." She paused, thinking. "It's exciting, in a way... All those enormous paintings wrapped and stacked and loaded into crates. And the bare walls left behind, just dark squares where the paintings had been."
Christine skimmed a page, frowning, then raised her eyes to Meg. "You think it's true, then? The Prussians are coming here?"
Meg shrugged. "Who knows. Monsieur de Gas thinks it is likely. He plans to join the Garde Nationale."
"He does? But what about his painting? I thought you're still sitting for him."
"For now. But if the Prussians really are coming…" Meg shook her head, "Helena left yesterday, with her family."
"To New Orleans?"
"I don't know. Their apartment was empty this morning. Someone had written all over their door - Death to spies, all that garbage. But there's nothing for her here anyway, not until the theatres open again."
That did not seem likely to be soon; the city was gearing for war. Uniformed National Guards patrolled the streets, and a curfew had already been imposed. Christine could barely recognise Paris in this dark, nervous city, where people cast furtive glances at each other, wondering if there were spies within the walls, where even the theatres and the cafés-concerts had been silenced. During the day, meetings were held at the Variétés: banners and red armbands, men in blouses and caps, and women shouting. Music was forgotten.
"I'll be done in a minute," she said to Meg, indicating the ink bottle. "But we should do something about supper."
"I'll go start it," Meg sighed, closing her catalogue. "It is my turn."
They could no longer afford Josette's help in the kitchen, and cooking was a skill neither of them had needed at the Opéra. Even Madame Giry had little patience with it, so supper was mostly bread and cheese, or perhaps eggs. Today there would be pears also, sweet and nearly overripe, with translucent yellow skin. Christine had seen prudent housewives buying them up at the markets to make preserves, and it seemed such a sad waste, turning these beautiful things ageless and vinegary instead of savouring their one perfect moment.
She took the ink back to the parlour, thinking to finish at the piano, but Madame Giry was there, reading in an armchair under the lamp, and Christine decided to leave it for the night. Madame Giry looked up as she came to tidy away her notes, then returned to her book. Christine was grateful for this tactful retreat, for the space Madame Giry granted her, for understanding her need if not the deeper compulsion that drove it. Their apartment, never large, was becoming cramped with the cabin fever of three people deprived of their livelihood and their daily routine, but Madame Giry had had years of compressing her world to a tiny room in the Opéra and it was only now that Christine began to understand that this, too, was a kind of self-discipline.
"Shall we eat?" she suggested. "Meg has just gone to put the coffee on. I bought pears."
"Thank you, my dear." Madame Giry marked her page with a household receipt, and in the lamplight Christine caught sight of the illustration: a lavishly detailed drawing of a flayed leg, peeled of skin.
"Oh!" Christine knew her disgust and puzzlement must be plain, because Madame Giry gave her a tolerant, gentle look and lowered the book to her inspection. The title read, Anatomie générale. Christine felt more than a little foolish; it was an old anatomy textbook.
"We have much to learn from Bichat, when it comes to the understanding of dance," Madame Giry said, setting it aside. "He teaches how the movements are made, from within. Perhaps I ought to thank our sombre new government for giving us leisure to study."
"There may be no shortage of this if the war comes," Christine said, looking away from the book. Despite herself, she found her eyes returning to piano, but it really was too late to be thinking of playing...
Madame Giry rose to her feet and touched Christine's cheek fondly, discerning the direction of her gaze. "Your music is beautiful, child. Your father would be very proud."
"My father... Do you recall much about him?" Christine asked as they made their way to the dining room. "How did you come to be friends, when we first came to Paris?"
"Ah," Madame Giry smiled, "that is an old story."
"Oh please, maman," Meg added her voice to Christine's, as she finished setting the table. "Do tell us."
Madame Giry sat and took up her knife. "There is little enough to tell." She cut a piece of cheese, but did not eat. "Gustave was… what some people would call a musician born. When he held the violin, you might lose an hour or half a day merely watching his hands, his fingers. The most unmusical of peasants would stop to listen. He had that power, but I do not suppose he really knew it."
"But there were those who did?" Meg prompted.
"Of course. He had patrons, wealthy men of the world…" She glanced at Christine, "Some of the brightest stars of society vied to have him play in their salons. The old Comtesse de Chagny, your young Vicomte's grandmother, was one such, though by no means the greatest. Gustave cared nothing for that, he would play in a roadside inn as readily as at a glittering soirée. And of course, he played at the Opéra. In the summer, when the season was over in Paris, he was invited to visit with the Comtesse in Perros-Guirec."
"The house by the sea," Christine murmured, her own food neglected. She remembered those long days playing by the sea with Raoul, seemingly so much older and wiser, his pale hair lit by the setting sun. How beautiful it had been.
"That's right, the house by the sea. I had taken Meg there also, for the summer, to stay with a friend. Gustave recognised us one morning as you and the young Vicomte were playing."
"Was I there too?" Meg asked curiously.
"You were too busy with your own friends, each noisier than the next," Madame Giry laughed. "The ones you played with every summer, Madame Duchamp's girls."
"Raoul?" Christine reminded her.
"I'm afraid that is all I know of it," Madame Giry said. "Gustave spent many hours with the two of you, and we would speak sometimes of the future… He knew even then, I think, that his health was failing. At the end of that summer he asked me if I might consent to take you with me to the Opéra to study, when the time comes. He did not think it would come so soon."
The scrape of a key in the door made them all stop. Christine turned to the sound; it had come from beyond the parlour, from the front door.
Meg had started to get up; Madame Giry clasped her wrist firmly. "Stay here. I will go and see. Perhaps it is Josette."
"It is not Josette," Christine said very softly, her eyes on the dining-room doors.
Very slowly, she picked up her napkin and placed it before her on the table. Then she got up, and, watched by Meg and Madame Giry, went back through the parlour.
He had not lit the lamp. He did not need to. In the faint light from the parlour, Christine had no difficulty discerning the black figure outlined by her own shadow against the white-painted door: black evening frock-coat, boots, tall hat… The ghost of a ghost.
Christine, she heard, so low it might have been a wish in her mind.
His mouth was half-hidden by a frayed rag, tied loosely beneath his hat, so that she could not be sure he had spoken. Something was wrong with his clothing too, he wore it uneasily, like a dead man's suit, and a mouldering stench emanated from him in the little hallway.
She took an involuntary step back.
"Christine!" He had certainly spoken then, Christine saw the fabric mask flutter. It was a horrific thing, a rag with an eyehole ripped into it that hid his scars and shaded the open half of his face, concealing his eyes from her. Yet when she heard his voice, there could be no doubt. He was alive.
"Erik." She was unsure of her own voice, but it came out admirably clear. "You've returned."
"Yes."
I waited... She swallowed. "You might have knocked."
"I frightened you. Forgive me, I did not think you would want the world to see you receive visitors after curfew."
He offered her something, Christine looked down: a wire mechanism, designed as a key, cupped in his bare hands. No gloves. His fingers trembled badly; the nails were thin black crescents, dirty and broken. In the near-darkness, she could not tell if it was dirt, or—
"Blood?" she whispered, dismayed.
Without warning, the hallway was flooded with white light. Madame Giry stepped back from the lamp, extinguishing a match, Meg behind her. Erik was shielding his face and Christine blinked, startled, conscious of having been caught in the spotlight holding his hands.
Madame Giry took in the scene. "Good grief, monsieur. You look freshly dug up."
Erik lowered his arm. "In a manner of speaking. Time is short, but could I trouble you for some soap? I fear the effects of dusty roads on bandaged skin are… regrettable."
"It may take more than soap," Madame Giry said wryly, looking from his damp-stained suit to the hanks of greasy, matted hair falling around his mask. She frowned at the rag: "Whatever you may think of your face, this is not an improvement. Monsieur, what is the meaning of this?"
"The war," Christine said, looking at him properly now. She met his eyes, forgetting the mask and costume. "You saw the fighting. Didn't you."
Erik inclined his head a fraction, in assent. "May I come in? I would speak with you, if you permit it... Christine."
She hesitated, then stood back, allowing him to pass. Behind her, she heard Meg mutter, "I'll heat some water," and retreat towards the kitchen.
Madame Giry went on ahead to the parlour, turning on the gaslight as she went. Erik paused by the chest of drawers, perhaps intending to remove his hat, but continued on as he was, and Christine followed him.
"Sit please," Madame Giry said, in the flat tone Christine recognised from the times she and Meg had been in trouble. "Monsieur Duchamp tells me his extraordinary architect has ignored all requests to return from Sedan. Explanations appear to be in order."
Erik glanced at the divan, but made no move to sit. Christine too remained standing.
"Forgive me," he said, "but I dare not stop to explain. I bear a message for - for Mademoiselle Daaé."
"Message?" Christine said, perplexed, thinking of his only letter, unfinished music. But he could not mean that.
Erik turned towards her stiffly, almost reluctantly, and she realised he was afraid:
"Yes. From the Vicomte de Chagny."
From a concealed pocket in his coat, he brought out something pale grey, rounded like a bone. Even before she heard its whisper, Christine recognised it: a poppyseed rattle. Her fingers found the corner of the armchair and gripped it. A chill wave crept over her body, cold seawater, turning her skin numb. Her lips moved:
"Raoul…" She did not want to know. "Erik, is he alive?"
"I cannot say. Come at once." She saw him make an effort to moderate his tone. "Please."