He awoke with a start, at about 2am, sweating and panting. He had had a horrible, terrifying dream. He had seen a gypsy man, with a look of content on his face, escorting a young boy of about ten away, while counting the money the boy''s mother had payed him for taking the child. The boy, whose face was in shadow, was weeping, saddened at the fact that his mother loathed him so much as to sell him to a gypsy. The gypsy took a stick, and beat the boy, telling him to shut up or face the consequences. The boy shut up, but hugged closer his one possession, a monkey doll with little cymbals on it''s hands. Soon the two met up with a group of other gypsies, who proceeded to set up booths, a traveling fair. The man walked up to an empty animal cage, and the boy seemed to know that he was going to be stuffed into that cage, as his muscles stiffened (his face was continually in shadow). The man then instructed the boy that whenever costumers came to the booth, he would ring the monkey''s cymbals, and he would come. Before he left, he shrouded the boy''s face with a potato sack with eye holes. The boy then watched as the gypsy began to set up a cloth booth, but the boy couldn''t seem to be able to read what was written on the cloth. Soon, costumers came, and the little boy, all soot covered and quite nervous, cautiously rang the little cymbals. The man slowly walked into the cage, and knocked the boy to the ground. He proceeded to beat the child mightily, while the boy looked at all the costumers laughing at him. As the boy looked around, he saw one girl that looked entirely unhappy about him being beaten. She too was about ten. Just then, the gypsy ripped the cover off the boy''s face, turned the boy''s face to the crowd, and said ''''Behold! The Devil''s child!''''. At that, the crowd left, throwing coins into the cage for the gypsy. However, the girl that had not been laughing, lingered for a few moments. As she turned, the boy untied a rope that was tied to the cage. Just before she left, he snuck up behind the gypsy, who was picking up the money with a disgusting grin on his face, and wrapped the rope around his neck, strangling the gypsy. When the girl heard this, she turned and stared in bewilderment. She then urged the boy to follow her, and they ran off just as the police came and started running after the boy with shouts of ''''MURDERER!'''' The two children turned the corner a bit before the police did, and she opened a small window of the opera house, and shoved him into the room, telling him to wait for her there. She ran off before the police could see her, and ran into the opera house. The boy was in the room, waiting for her, looking around to see if he could spot her. When she came down, she opened a door, and led him down into the catacombs. That is when he woke up.
He thought what this dream could have meant. He couldn''t recall ever reading a story of the sort, or writing it in a song or opera. Then it hit him, this was his own memory. How he had come to live at the opera house. Now that he had remembered this, he started to think more about that event. He had been ten then, that had been forty years prior. He was surprised to think that he was fifty years old. He had never remembered what year he had been born. He didn''t feel fifty. He looked himself over. He didn''t look fifty either. He was interested in why he looked and felt thirty years younger than he actually was. He felt though, that he would explore this interesting fact later in the morning. For the time being, he wanted to know who that girl had been. The girl who had saved him. For the life of him, he couldn''t remember. He searched every inch of his mind to recall that girl''s name, but no matter how long he thought, or how close he thought he got to remembering, he couldn''t quite get it. He remembered full well that she had told him her name, so he knew that he knew it. As he thought, he grew weary once again, and fell into a much easier sleep than before.