September 7th 1892: Christine
Meg remained silent long after I had stopped speaking. I had spent the first thirty minutes of my visit telling her everything about my son´s teacher and the little one´s peculiar behaviour. Apart from his fear of sunlight he developed an almost obsessive love of the night. More than once I had caught him wandering around in the darkness or gazing longingly at the moon. I had always sent him to bed immediately, but his tired face in the morning had been a clear sign that he hadn´t slept.
After a while Meg cleared her throat and asked: "Why don´t you simply lock the door or make one of the maids sleep in Philippe´s room?". I had never quite realised how much of her mother´s rationality she had inherited. Her question would have been a good one in a normal situation. Unfortunately this situation was far from normal. "I´ve tried all that.", I replied. "But it didn´t work. I found the maid fast asleep in the morning, whereas he was awake. And one night…" I cast a brief glance over my shoulder to make sure my friend had really sent the servant away before going on: "…I heard him walk down the corridor. Yet when I got up no one was there. Of course I checked Philippe´s room… and the door was still locked! How did he manage to get out without opening it?".
We looked at each other and shivered, despite the afternoon sunshine coming through the large windows of the dressing room. Meg seemed to be nearly as confused as I was, which made me feel terrible. Maybe I had said too much. "What lovely curtains you have!", I exclaimed with a forced smile. "Have you bought them recently?" Yet my friend didn´t go along with my attempt to distract her. "Erik must have taught him.", she muttered. Suddenly seizing my hand she went on: "Oh Christine, you have to talk to him! God knows what else he´ll show him!".
I nodded slowly, having arrived at the same conclusion. "But those aren´t topics I can discuss with him over a cup of tea.", I argued. "He´d simply lie and tell me that I must have imaged things." "Then you have to…" Meg interrupted herself and looked around in the room, apparently searching for a good idea. Her gaze stopped at the clock on the mantelpiece.
"How long will Philippe stay with Erik today?", she wanted to know. "Till five.", I answered, wondering why on earth that was important. "Now it´s only half past two.", Meg informed me. "If you went to the opera and sneaked down to his lair, you could perhaps catch him doing something bad. Even he couldn´t deny it if he´s just showing the boy how to pick a lock. You´d have proof!"
Meg seemed to be rather enthusiastic about her idea, and I began to like it as well. "That could actually work.", I whispered. "Of course it´ll work.", she said with a gentle smile, patting my hand reassuringly. "I´m sure you´ll be able to talk Erik into teaching your child only decent things. He can be a… well, a sensible man." Though her last sentence hadn´t been very convincing, I decided to leave at once. After all, it was not as if I had come up with a better plan.
The coach was ready barely five minutes later. My friend, who had accompanied me out of the house to bid me farewell, eyed the coachman with fascination. "Since when do you have him?", she asked in a low voice. It sounded much more interested than my question about the curtains. I could understand her excitement, though. Gabriel was young, blond and very good-looking.
"That´s quite a funny story, actually.", I said, making the decision that my departure could wait for a little while. "I´m certain you still remember the coachman we had before, the old, surly one. And you also know our cook, don´t you? The elderly woman with the wart on her nose, the only person in our house who never smiled?" Meg nodded, her eyes shining with eagerness. Though she was no longer a common ballet rat, she could still sense good gossip.
Pleased by her sincere interest I went on: "It seems that the two of them were in love for almost a year. We never noticed anything, but when I entered the kitchen in the morning three days ago I found a letter saying they had left to get married and would look for work in Normandy afterwards. The cook´s family lives there, you know.". "So they´ve simply eloped? That´s so romantic." She gave a little sigh. I could only agree with her. The knowledge that even those two people had found someone to love was strangely comforting.
"We had to hire Gabriel then.", I added, although this fact was rather obvious. "Raoul would have preferred a person with more work experience, but he was the only one we could find this quickly. So Raoul had to accept him. The alternative would have been walking to every meeting. Fortunately finding a new cook was much easier. We had one within hours." "I hope she´s not young and pretty.", Meg remarked with a slight laugh. "Otherwise you´ll have the next elopement soon." "She´s married.", I assured her. "So there´s-" "Madame!", the coachman called. "Didn´t you say something about leaving early?" "Of course!", I exclaimed. For a moment I had completely forgotten about my plans. "Goodbye Meg!" "Goodbye Christine! And good luck!" We shared a brief embrace, then I climbed into the coach and it departed.
The journey back was shorter than usual. It was true that Gabriel didn´t have a lot of experience, but he knew how to drive a coach. It wasn´t even a quarter to four when we reached the opera and I hurried inside. Fortunately no one saw me. I made my way down to Erik´s underground world slowly and cautiously, yet it seemed that the traps that could have been found in every corridor ten years ago were no longer working. Or maybe Erik didn´t need them anymore because nobody knew this way to the lair existed. The latter option was more likely.
Yet whichever was the correct one, it helped me proceed more quickly. Soon I stood at the door of Erik´s home. Before I could decide whether to knock or simply walk in the door was opened and the teacher himself appeared. The corners of his mouth twitched, but the result resembled a smirk far more than a smile. "Madame de Chagny!", he greeted me with an exaggerated bow. "What a pleasure to have you as a guest in my humble abode!"
I glanced at him with barely hidden surprise. Since when did Erik talk to me like that? "Erm… good day!", I muttered uneasily. "I´m here a little early…" "But no, Madame!", he assured me. "That is absolutely no problem. Philippe and I are almost finished anyway. Why don´t you come in and join us?" He took a step backwards, and I entered the house. "Thank you…", I mumbled, staring at the floor.
Following Erik down the corridor I silently cursed myself for behaving like the shy ingénue I had once been. Hadn´t I planned to surprise him doing something terrible? Now he had surprised me. How could he have known I was coming? Could he control everything that was going on in the opera at the same time as he taught my son? I came to the conclusion that he probably could, and it scared me slightly.
Finally we arrived at the end of the corridor, at the door behind which was Erik´s study. I had never been allowed to go into that room, and I was fairly certain that I still didn´t want to do it. Yet he had already opened the door, and given the fact that Philippe seemed to be in there I didn´t have a choice. After all, I wanted to find out what happened in those lessons.
"Maman!", my child greeted me, but I missed his usual enthusiasm. He was standing right in front of me in the dimly lit room, but made no attempt to do as much as touch me. It was so dark that I couldn´t make out the opposite wall. ´It´s no wonder that he isn´t used to being in the sun anymore.´, I thought. When he glanced up at me I saw an unnatural sparkle in his eyes, but dismissed it as a trick of the candle light. "What are you talking about at the moment?", I asked. The only thing I could be sure of was that it wasn´t reading. That wouldn´t have been possible in the semi-darkness.
Erik walked up to Philippe and placed his large bony hands on the boy´s shoulders. "We´re discussing the anatomy of human beings.", he replied conversationally. "Especially the differences between men and women…" "Are you certain that is… appropriate at such an early age?", I muttered cautiously. "You´re not… showing him pictures or anything like that, are you?" He shook his head. "Quite the contrary, Madame.", he said silkily. "Quite the contrary…" With these words he stepped aside, pulling my son with him. Now I could see that they had stood in front of a table. And on the table lay… My breath caught in my throat. On the table lay two dead bodies, one male and one female.