Epilogue: Redemption

The skeleton of the Sacré-Coeur crowned the hillside like a Catholic Taj Mahal, its bone-white domes shining in the menacing sky where clouds gathered with a chill wind. Inside the site's provisional chapel, the congregants warmed their chapped fingers under the candelabra, and spoke of a possible blizzard.

Although she tried, Alice could not uplift her mood, even as the priest delivered a sparkling sermon on hope overcoming fear, forgiveness overcoming hatred. The chapel walls glowed with the golden light of the candelabra, but there was no light in her heart. She had not forgotten that the extraordinary man who had lived beneath the Opera did not return her tender sentiments.

With the service finished, the heavy double doors were opened, and the worshippers stepped out into the freezing cold. Snow had indeed begun to fall, in heavy flakes that swirled in the wind and collected on piles of masonry in deep drifts. Eager to be in their warm homes, the congregants were quick to disband. The streets surrounding the hillside were already deserted. Alice paused on the stone steps of the church to take in the serenity of the falling snow.

Then she saw him.

She wasn't certain that it was indeed Erik whom she had just seen. But, for a moment, as the departing crowd thinned, she had caught a glimpse of a somber-looking man, wearing a heavy wool cloak and broad-brimmed hat, and waiting patiently in the shadows behind some masonry equipment. He faced the scattered bricks at his feet, and the wide brim of his hat hid his face from view.

A singular movement had caught her eye: As another screaming wind ripped along the tor, the man kept his chin glued to his chest and withdrew his hand from the pocket of his cloak to hold the hat in place.

She nearly started. Unmistakably, it was Erik's hand.

He was not wearing gloves, despite the bitter cold, and she saw distinctly the long, bony fingers that seemed almost yellow against the pure falling snow. He had deliberately removed his gloves so that she alone might recognize him.

With her heart in her throat, she crossed the deserted avenue. He lifted his chin as she neared, and she saw the edge of a white opera mask under his hat.

Any doubts as to the man's identity were dispelled as he began to speak:

"I feared that I would serve my penance all alone," he sighed, in a rich, melancholy voice that Alice had feared she would never hear again. He pushed at the brim of his hat, so that their eyes could meet. In the blinding white snowfall, however, she only saw two cavernous, dark holes. His golden eyes could only be seen in the darkness, or so she was learning.

"How did you know I was coming?"

"I know you well enough." He lifted her chin with one bone-cold finger. "Had you wanted, you could have paid me a visit months ago. I've been waiting a long time."

She looked down at her shoes and sighed. "I'm nothing like your singer Christine Daaé. My time is spent with chemicals and retorts, not perfume and pretty costumes... I suppose that explains why no man has ever taken an interest in me. I can't blame you for being like the rest."

She turned to storm off down the street towards home, but he grabbed her arm.

"I find nothing offensive about you, nothing at all! Did I not invite you to my home, take you across Lake Avern myself, and share with you what I have not shared with another soul on this Earth? Would I have done all that, if I detested you?"

She stared mutely at him.

"Try to understand, Alice," he continued, releasing her arm with a sigh. "It's not you whom I find offensive, but myself… I, too, have loved and lost." He gazed past her, into the white shroud of his memory. "It can never, ever be—because of my terrifying ugliness! You're shaking your head, you angel!—but you know it to be true! If I had a normal face—not even a handsome face, mind you, but one at least tolerable to look at—would I not have won her affection?... I realize now that it cannot be. If I am ever to find happiness in my wretched life, I need to accept what cannot be. And then, in the short time I've known you, my regard for your nature has eclipsed all else within my heart."

"Erik," she cried, still shaking her head, "why are you telling me this?"

"Why?" he repeated, as though her question had drawn him back from some deep reverie. "Do you love me, Alice, truly?"

"I've already told you that I do."

Another freezing gust of wind tugged at their clothes and all but knocked them over. The falling snow surrounded them in a white veil, as though they were the only two people in the world. A blanket of snow had transformed the grounds into a white fairyland, and there was no sound.

"I'm considerably older than you, Alice," he whispered when the wind had subsided. "Five years younger than the Commissioner."

She nodded, not bothering to ask how he knew her father's age. It seemed almost natural that he know everything.

"By now, you're aware," he sighed, "that I will always be cursed with this hideous face. I cannot live as you do, above. I am condemned to the darkness below."

"But I don't love you out of pity—if you never changed at all, I would be happy... I only wish someone felt the same for me."

"How could I not love you as you are? I've never met a woman whose physical attraction so perfectly demonstrated the beauty of her heart!" His voice sounded almost angry. "And if it weren't for your interest in the grotesque, then how could our paths have crossed?... You were right when you hinted that we are a perfect match—I knew it, I think, when we met in the catacombs. I had never seen such bravery in a woman... Come with me," he said suddenly, and led her behind a small grove of old oak trees, where the pair would be invisible to the Sûreté patrolling the grounds. "You suppose that some commitment to Mlle. Daaé prevents me from accepting your proposal, but in truth my reluctance is due to my affection for you. How can I condemn you, dear Alice, to the same Hell in which I myself suffer? I would rather continue in this torture alone—though I might die from it!... But if it's true that you're as lonely as I, and that my company gives you pleasure ... But think of what you're asking, Alice! Would you really promise yourself—body, heart, and mind—to a monster? And once you swear yourself to me—once I give in to trust, you know—you cannot go back on your promise to live with this hideous beast forever!"

Her only answer was a charming smile more brilliant than the snowfall surrounding them.

Mesmerized by her beauty, he stared into her eyes, but he was too grave to mirror her cheerful grin. Taking both of her hands in his, he dropped to one knee in the freezing snow. "Marry me, Alice Mifroid, I beg you —and release my soul from its lonely torment... I even have a ring," he added, reaching into his waistcoat pocket, "but that won't surprise you, clever girl, as you've already seen it."

Alice was speechless. Her little mouth had dropped open in surprise.

"No doubt you suspect that my intentions are dishonorable," he continued, still kneeling in the drift of snow. "Listening to myself, I hardly know what I'm saying—I'm proposing a crucifixion! I'm asking you to forfeit your every Earthly pleasure, only so that my torment might be more bearable... But I swear by Heaven that you alone, Alice, can save me. Did you think I didn't recognize how wholly your character compliments my own? —But the ground is so cold! Say something, please."

"Yes!" she cried, mustering all her strength to untie her tongue. "It's no sacrifice, for me. I'll join you happily."

For a moment he could do nothing but hold her trembling hands and close his eyes in ecstasy, until the sting in his leg from the frozen ground brought him back to himself. Then he was again on his feet, and his fiancée wore his ring. Bashfully, the couple rejoined the path leading back to the city. It brought an indescribable joy to Erik's soul, to see how her eyes lit up when she looked at him!

But on this Earth all good things come to an end, and too soon the pair found themselves at the exit of the grounds.

"I must leave you, I'm afraid," he said, untangling her arm from his. "I fear if I venture any farther, the Commissioner's men will see you with me, and that can only lead to awkward questions."

"When shall I see you again?"

"It will not be soon. I doubt that I will have another blizzard for cover."

"Then may I ask what name I shall take when we are married?"

He drew back in surprise, and then his lips lifted in such a wide smile that she caught a glimpse of his white teeth. He removed the broad-brimmed hat, brought his lips by her ear, and whispered the name so softly that Alice almost didn't hear.

It was an honorable name.

Before he withdrew, he kissed her on the temple, and Alice blushed with such violence that she wondered why she didn't melt the snow beneath her feet. He replaced the hat with lowered eyes and offered a chivalrous bow.

"Go now, Alice," he commanded, "before they suspect something, and come looking for me."

Reluctantly she tore herself away. Three times she looked back and saw his dark figure in the shadows of a stunted pine, his eyes never leaving her. In those eyes she saw a new light, glowing even in the white snowfall, and she knew that at last he had found the will to live.

The End