September 18th 1892: Christine
It took the Inspector another half an hour to get through all kinds of formalities before we were finally free to go. The policemen retreated to the house, probably to check whether they were still needed there. With all that I had learned about Inspector Claudoir tonight, I was sure he'd find an activity to keep himself busy. Men like him couldn't bear being unoccupied.
"So… where are we going now?" Raoul asked, looking at me.
"How am I supposed to know the answer to that complicated question?" I muttered, batting my eyelashes, a silly smile on my lips. "I'm just a frightened little woman."
"Of course," he gave back, rolling his eyes in a way that a frightened little woman would have found highly offensive. "How could I have forgotten what a delicate little creature you are?" He leaned down to me, and we shared a long, loving kiss. It felt like the first kiss for a very long time. My body tingled pleasantly.
The sound of someone clearing their throat made us break apart. Marielle came walking towards us. I had been too busy to realise she had even left.
"I don't want to interrupt you, but we should really get away from here," she reminded us. "I've just talked to that young policeman to tell him about where the police can find Victor and what he has to do with everything. But now we should go. If Inspector Claudoir sees that we're still here, he'll probably come back and question us again."
Raoul and I looked at each other and nodded. She had a point. I didn't think I could stand being asked questions a second time, and Raoul appeared to be completely exhausted as well.
"We should go to the de Gableauxs first," I said, in my normal voice. The time for playing games was over, at least for the moment. "Larisse and the children are there. And afterwards…" I shrugged. "I don't know. Erik wanted to go and ask Meg whether we can stay with her, but… What time is it?"
"Half past eight," Raoul replied, consulting his pocket watch. I noticed that the glass was broken, probably from the fight.
Where had the time gone? It felt as if I had only left the house to go to the opera a few minutes ago… or else a life-time ago. I couldn't tell which one was more likely. It was as if we had lived outside the normal time for the last hours, only to be thrown back into it now. It wasn't dark in the garden yet, which created an illusion of day-time, yet only now did I realise that it was just the fire shining brightly from the house, like a bizzare version of the sun. The part of the garden close to the wall was illuminated by the streetlamps outside as well, but apart from the, it was pefectly dark.
"Half past eight?" I repeated slowly, thinking hard. "Meg's performance isn't nearly over. Erik won't have had time to talk to her yet."
It felt strange to think that life had gone on just as usual for the rest of the world, that there was a place where people had spent the last hour laughing and applauding, with nothing to worry about except whether they liked the music they were listening to or whether their clothes were appropriate for the opera.
I looked down at myself. My clothes were dirty and torn in some places. I thought back to how carefully I had chosen them in the morning. Would I have chosen different clothes if I had known what would happen? Probably not. If I had known what would happen, I'd have made my children and everyone else leave the house and not come back until everything was over. That would have been far more important than clothes.
I could have actually lost them. I could have lost some of the most important people in my life. The knowledge had been at the back of my mind all the time, but now it attacked me without warning. I started trembling and broke out in a cold sweat. My breathing turned into panting as I realised what a narrow miss it had been. I could have lost my children.
"Christine? Christine, what's wrong with you?" Raoul called. It sounded as if he were very far away. I looked at him, but couldn't get his picture to stand still. It was spinning around.
"Make her lie down," someone else said. "And get the doctor!"
The earth shuddered, and I was lifted off my feet. I closed my eyes, listening to nothing but the pounding of the blood in my ears. My children…
"Madame?" Somebody was patting my cheek gently. "Madame de Chagny?"
I opened my eyes slowly, pleased to see that the world had stopped spinning. It was a small comfort. Looking up, I saw a man kneeling next to me. He had short, iron-grey hair and a rather large nose. I had never met him before.
"Who are you?" I asked.
"My name is Marette," he replied slowly and clearly. "I am a doctor."
A second face appeared next to his.
"Christine! Are you all right?" Raoul wanted to know nervously. "We were talking, and suddenly you fainted. We fetched the doctor as quickly as we could. Oh, this is all my fault. I should have insisted that you went to him while I was talking to the police. I made you wait too long. I should have – "
"I'm fine," I interrupted him, groping blindly for his hand. When I found it, I squeezed it reassuringly. "You shouldn't have done anything differently. If you had brought me to the doctor sooner, Inspector Claudoir would have come to me later to talk about everything, and that's exactly what I wanted to avoid."
He gave me a tentative smile.
"How is she, Doctor Marette?" he then asked.
"Well, she woke up fairly quickly, she can talk, and she seems to remember all that has happened," the doctor replied. "Those are all good signs. The bump on the side of her head will still hurt for a while, and for a few weeks, she should avoid everything that makes her exhausted. Combine it with a healthy diet and a lot of rest, and she'll be fine in no time." He smiled down at me.
I would have been content with the diagnosis, but my husband wasn't.
"But why did she faint then?" he wanted to know. "One moment we were having a normal conversation, and in the next she passed out. Can this happen again?"
The doctor threw me a sideways glance, then he leaned closer to Raoul. It was clear that he didn't want me to hear what he was saying, but I strained my ears and could understand at least a little of it.
"…has been through a lot today," the doctor whispered. "…such a reaction… not surprising at all… the consequences on the mind are worse than the physical ones… she watched her house burn… she was nearly killed… if she ponders about what could have happened, things like that can occur again, yes… you've got to ease her mind… be gentle…"
He straightened up and smiled at me again, as if nothing extraordinary had happened. Yet this time, I did not return the smile. I didn't like people who treated me like a stupid child.
"I believe there are still more people I should pay a visit to," he said.
"Yes, there are," Raoul answered. "As a matter of fact, you should probably better have a look at all of us. We've all been involved, in one way or the other."
"I see," the doctor muttered, looking at Raoul's face. "But right here and now? Well, I'll see what I can do."
I closed my eyes again as he got to his feet. I wasn't feeling faint anymore, but at the moment, there was nothing to see anyway. I listened to the footsteps around me, to mumbled words and different kinds of sounds telling me that Doctor Marette was examining Raoul, Marielle and Pierre.
I only opened my eyes when he said:
"Well, that should be enough for the moment. You've all been very lucky. No permanent damage has been done by the fire. However, I shall come to you tomorrow morning and examine you again, just to make sure everything is all right. Send me a note saying where to find you.".
He turned around and was about to leave when I scrambled to my feet and caught him by the arm.
"You can't go yet," I told him. "You have to see my children first."
"But I've already done so, Madame," he said. "I thought you knew about it. That was the reason why I didn't come here sooner. A woman waited for me at the gate to your estate and said I had to examine two children in the house next to yours first. She claimed they had been involved in the fire, too. So I had a look at them – and at the woman herself as well – and I can assure you they're fine. Very exhausted and a little scared, but fine. They'll have to stay in bed for one or two days, but they'll make a full recovery."
"Oh, thank God," I breathed. "And what about Jacqueline and Jacques?" I asked a moment later. "The two people who were unconscious?"
"They have been brought to hospital," he answered. "Their condition is very serious, and… but they'll be fine." He smiled yet again, but didn't meet my eye. I strongly suspected that he was doing what he had called ´easing my mind´.
Raoul seemed to have noticed it as well, for he said:
"Please, Doctor, give us an honest answer. Will they recover?".
The doctor looked from my husband to me and back.
"I don't know," he replied quietly. "The smoke seems to have done a lot of damage to the young woman's lungs, and the man… we, he is rather old, and unless I'm much mistaken, he has had problems with his heart before. But all that is only the result of my first examination, before I sent them to hospital. It could have already become much better by now."
"Or much worse," Raoul uttered what I was thinking as well. "Isn't there anything we can do?"
"Try to recover as well as you can," the doctor answered. "And pray. Praying always helps."