Chapter Thirteen

It was a standstill; Miford triumphant, Erik enraged, Christine utterly confused. It wasn't until he pulled a badge from his lapel that she realized the graveness of her mistake. Her jaw dropped in spite of herself, and she cowered against the wall.

"Inspector Gaston Miford of the Paris Police. Christine Daae, you are wanted for the murder of Raoul de Chagny. But I'm sure you already know that. And...you," he turned to Erik, willing not to let his embarrassment for lack of proper name spoil his victory. He opened his mouth to continue, but the man (man?) bore down on him with such contempt, superiority and malice that he had to turn back to the woman, who was now in tears.

"Not to mention," he continued, struggling to regain his footing, "evasion of the police for a year and a half. Christine Daae, you and you companion are under arrest."

Christine knew not whether to dissolve into a sobbing heap at his feet, as she wanted to, or reason with him as she imagined one should, but was not sure she could manage to. Luckily, she did not have to do either, for Erik spoke up, his voice rich and velvety as if this were a simple gathering among friends.

"What evidence do you have against us?"

Miford faltered. Especially after the first year, colleagues had never failed to point out the lack of concrete evidence in the case, a point which he'd waved away as invalid and trivial. But now...? Now what could he do? What could he say?

The more Christine considered, the more she found the significance of Erik's question. What proof, true, solid proof, did anyone have against them? They'd left only Raoul's body. The house by the lake, in theory, could have belonged to anyone. The legend of the Opera Ghost was just that -- a legend -- and could never hold up as reasonable evidence.

Christine returned from her thoughts to find Miford rambling about sightings of the Opera Ghost; Erik countered that such sightings were done by either foolish ballet rats or senile old bats, and everyone knew that, and beside, what the devil did the Opera Ghost have anything to do with him? Simply that he wore a mask meant nothing. What evidence did anyone have of the Opera Ghost existing, anyway?

And suddenly an idea hatched in Christine's mind, one that she was almost certain could pull them from the trap of the inspector forevermore.

No one could ever prove the plot of Don Juan...Erik had had the only copy of the full script; others had only been assigned what pertained to them...which did not include "The Point of No Return." For all they knew...

Yes! She was quite sure that if she carried out her plan, he'd have no honest choice but to believe her and let them be. The only snare of his idea was that carrying it out would shatter all ties to Raoul that she had...if she still had any, that was, after the previous night.

Safety or honor? Lies or silence?

And the hardest of them all.

Raoul...or Erik?

That was when she heard it, and looking back, she couldn't be quite certain of whether she truly had, or his voice was simply a figment of her imagination; a true message from another world, or simply what she wanted to hear.

Above Erik and the inspector's arguing came Raoul's voice, almost a whisper, but clear just the same. "Christine, be happy...be safe...don't worry about me."

Then it was gone as quickly as it had come. Naturally, she wished to cry, or ask him more, or simply absorb the sacredness of what she'd heard, but she knew that with his blessing, he'd wanted her to act now.

"Monsieur Miford," she cried over the two men's voices, her voice coolness personified. She even sounded a bit annoyed. "Why have you come here to bother my husband and I?"

"Husband?" he spat.

"Husband?" he breathed.

Husband.

"Yes, husband," she powered on. "I don't know what you've heard, but I am Erik's wife."

"That's all well and good," replied the inspector after a moment of stunned silence, "but that does not explain what happened the night of Don Juan Triumphant."

"Then I will, so we can get on with our lives. My husband composed Don Juan Triumphant, despite the various claims that the 'Opera Ghost' had. All silly lies. People only said so because my husband sports a mask to cloak his deformity, just as, according to those who have seen him, the Ghost did. Rubbish.

"In the opera, Aminta was intended to be kidnapped by Don Juan at the end of their duet. My husband had told me he'd felt the makeup of the actor was a bit risqué, but he'd gone through with it anyway. Just as he'd feared, the audience had been alarmed, thinking it was the Ghost or what have you, and that I was really being kidnapped. We went through with the scene as usual, but it became clear that no one was in any mood to see the rest of the performance. My husband took me away from France to wait for the gossip to die down."

Miford looked suspicious, yet beneath that, increasingly distraught. Erik looked dumbstruck.

"And Raoul de Chagny?"

She swallowed hard and pursed her lips silently before responding.

"I can't help you with that, Inspector. I...I barely knew the man."

Miford closed his eyes a moment, willing it all to go away. It all made perfect sense, which usually was not enough to satisfy him, but given his own entire lack of evidence, well...

The anonymous tipsters could very well have just been seeking a reward, and the first tip of Stockholm had been entirely valid; the man had sold the pair their tickets to escape, not from incarceration, but from bad publicity and chaos for both of them.

Could it be his life's devotion of the past months was an entire waste?

"Why was the character masked and deformed?" he barked suddenly, the rest of his question, "like you," hanging in the air. "It seems a bit too coincidental."

"Not at all," replied Erik smoothly, and Christine mentally thanked the heavens, for she knew not how to answer that.

"I intended to show the audience that deformed men, too, can be normal men. That they too...can be loved. I see now that society is not yet mature enough to accept that. I could not stand the public ridicule and countless questions, so I took my wife away."

"What proof do I have that you are truly wed?"

Christine fought not to let her panic show on her face.

Proof...proof...

It hit her.

She held up her left hand, its ring finger bearing two bands. She neared the Inspector so he could better see. "My engagement ring, the plain one, and my wedding ring, the bejeweled one. They compliment each other so well, I prefer to wear them together." The inspector looked defeated.

She crossed the floor to stand before Erik. Looking into his golden eyes, now glowing with admiration, she begged him to trust her.

With that, she removed his mask. Holding it at her side, she raised herself onto her tiptoes and kissed him, long and true.

His chest muscles were tense beneath her free hand, but he soon relaxed when her hand came to rest over his heart, silently imploring him to do the same. Only when he did so did she pull away and hand him back his mask.

Turning to the inspector, still within Erik's reach, she said, "Monsieur, I don't know what more proof I can offer."

A/N: Epilogue still to come