A/N: My dear ones, I apologize! This chapter has been a ridiculously long time in coming, I know. Blame it on the L's, if you wish (Lilly, my nearly-three-year-old, and Lexie, my four-month-old) – heaven knows it hasn't exactly been a walk in the park dealing with those two all day long, although of course I love them with all my heart. It was an especially difficult adjustment at first because I've not only been learning how to parent more than one child for the first time, but bringing a brand-new baby home was a first for me as well (those of you who've read my profile know that Lilly had to be in the hospital for her first three months, so I was pretty much completely robbed of the entire newborn adjustment phase as far as she was concerned. Ergo, when Lexie came home with me at a mere two days old, I was overwhelmingly clueless about this tiny, helpless creature, and even more frazzled because I still had to manage a girl in her terrible twos at the same time I was discovering my new baby). At any rate, now that Lexie's a little older and things have calmed down a bit, I've begun to find small slots of time in which to write, especially since a happier baby and a calmer household means a less tired and more creative, energetic self. But you can also blame the delay of this chapter on yet another particularly nasty case of writer's block (which, in all honesty, could, again, probably be traced back to my tired body and fried brain as a result of the L's) – I literally started and trashed about fifteen to twenty different drafts of this chapter (and many different plots) over the past several months before I finally hit on one that I liked enough to keep.
Note: I have a new Twitter account specifically for short, sweet updates on my writing progress, which should prove useful if you're experiencing an update drought and want to know what's going on. My username is little_sultana. My tweets aren't public, so if you want to follow them, just drop me a note saying you're from FFNet and I'll approve you.
"Brother."
He stirred softly, unwilling to come up from the depths of his thick, cocoon-like dreams.
A push on his shoulder, gentle but firm. "It's half-past ten."
There was a loud swish as the curtains were flung open. He haphazardly raised a limp hand in protest over his face, shielding it from the sudden rush of daylight, red through tightly closed lids. The beginnings of a head-ache were upon him, and his tongue felt thick and dry, his teeth coated with something singularly unpleasant.
She grabbed a bottle from the small round table next to his chair. "You've been drinking."
He put a hand to his temple. "Only a bit. Must you shout?"
"I am not shouting." She put a hand to his forehead. "It isn't like you to do this to yourself. Didn't Papa teach you anything? If he were here, he'd take a rod to your backside."
"I'm twenty-two years old," he said. "He'd likely say I'm merely becoming a man."
"A very foolish man." She threw the empty bottle into the waste-bin. "Don't let me catch you falling asleep in your chair again, especially from drink."
"Always the little mother, weren't you, Lenore?" He rose stiffly from his chair.
"I'm three years your senior," she said. "It's my duty to look after you and make certain you don't do anything stupid."
"Plenty of men drink when it suits them," he said. "It's not as though I've taken to card-playing or unsavory company—or, for that matter, as though I drink to excess."
"If you continue in this manner," she retorted, "you just might. You hardly used to touch a drop of the stuff, and now it seems that you're emptying bottles in one night. You need to find a wife. Forget about that unscrupulous little Swede from the Opera."
"It wasn't emptied in one night," he said. "It took me several nights to finish it off." The lie made him a little ill, but it was calculated to calm her, even if she looked as though she didn't quite believe him. At any rate, it wasn't as though he emptied bottles in one night on a regular basis. Not yet, at any rate.
He glanced at his desk, where Her letter still lay neatly folded in a locked drawer. All Her letters, for that matter, were in an immaculate pile inside, accumulated over the course of their courtship. He couldn't bring himself to burn them; they symbolized something tangible, proof of what they had borne over the past several months. Burning them would be as unthinkable as reducing a piece of his own soul to ashes.
Besides, he still held out a faint hope that she would repent of her decision in short order and appear one day on his door-step to fling herself into his arms, murmuring with her lips against his ear that it had been a case of nerves, a spectacular mistake. He was not vain; he was in a precarious state of teetering between hope, idealism, and a dreadful depression. He did not love anybody else, nor did he entertain any sort of expectations of doing so in the near future. If he found a wife now, he had no doubt that he could procure one amicable enough to make marriage endurable, but he had no wish to enter into a marriage which was merely to be endured. He had cherished rather grand expectations of marriage to Christine; he had loved her with all his heart, and still clung to that love a little desperately yet, even though every day which passed him by now seemed to drain away at his stamina and his sense of worth ever further.
Mme. Valerius had provided no answers when he had visited to inquire after her former ward. She had merely mumbled tiredly about how Christine had promised to write, and did the good gentleman know that she had once been taught by an angel? "Such a lovely voice," the old woman had murmured. "So lovely. She sang at the Opera. But her angel's gone now; leastwise, that's what she says. I do miss her, monsieur. I miss her dreadfully."
Remembering the hopeless feeling of being utterly cut off from Christine was like a dagger in his heart. How could she have been so cold as to not leave any hint of her whereabouts, even to her adopted mother? "She must have told you something of where she was going," he had begged gently, but the old woman had shaken her head heavily, muttering softly to herself. Marie, the nurse who attended the elderly dame, had confirmed that nothing had been left behind which gave any clue—no forwarding address, no letter of explanation for Marie, not even a note indicating how the nurse would be paid. ("A capricious thing she's done, sir, running out on Mme. like that, especially without some means of compensating for her care—I can hardly fathom it, for she seemed like such a good girl.") He could hardly have imagined it himself, but so matters stood; in a fit of impulse, he had offered to begin paying Marie himself for the old woman's tending, if there continued to be no news of Christine. He had no especial love for Mme. Valerius, but he knew that Christine could not have borne the old dame being placed in an institution or poor-house, there to live out the remainder of her fragile days in squalor and abuse. This alone made Christine's conspicuous absence and lack of instructions regarding her "mother" increasingly mystifying and infuriating, even frightening, for it made little sense in light of her affection for the elderly woman; he felt he owed Christine this much, at least, if it happened that she was actually in some kind of danger and unable to communicate properly or at all beyond what she had already written. As it was quite impossible for him (insofar as he knew) to discern whether she was indisposed or not, he thought it better to err on the side of caution—and compassion, for quite apart from his feelings for Christine, he had always possessed a kind heart—regarding the care of Mme. Valerius.
After waiting three days, he had dropped by again, hoping against hope that Christine had fulfilled her promise to her adopted mother to write, but no letter had come. He had waited for another fortnight before visiting again, but still Marie told him there had been no correspondence. Several disappointments occurred in this fashion until—too disheartened to continue—he had stopped visiting, politely asking instead that he be notified if there were any news. That had been three weeks ago now, and still there had been nothing of which he was aware.
He had considered asking Christine's friend, little Giry, for any news, but had constantly put it off in a fit of exhaustion and ill-temper, and had subsequently nearly forgotten that he had ever intended to ask. Besides, he had reasoned, if Christine had not written to the woman who had tended her for years, why should she have written to any of her acquaintances at the Opera?
He considered this again, now, and wondered at it once more. Perhaps Christine had written somebody…it might be worth asking, after all.
"Raoul," said his sister, and he was abruptly brought back to the present. "I forgot. There's a letter for you that came—" She looked at him sharply, and he immediately felt mildly embarrassed; was his sudden eagerness so transparent? "It isn't from her, at any rate…from some-one I've never heard of, an M. Chaubertin. Is he an associate of yours?"
Raoul took the letter from her hand. "Not that I recall," he said, hoping he did not sound quite so glum as he felt. He opened the letter boredly, vaguely noting the weight and substance of the paper; whoever the author of the letter, this was likely a man of some means.
M. le Vicomte de Chagny,
You do not know me; we have never met in person. I have gathered, however, from a few reliable sources I shall not (and, in the interest of professionalism, of course cannot) name, that you are anxious for news of a certain person. Do not bother to inquire as to how I have come by this information; information, sir, is my business, and I make it my business to know every thing. I believe I may have some enticing clues for you as to the whereabouts (or, at least, the trail) of the one you seek. The information will come at a price, of course—I do not bequeath charity even to my poorest clients, and you, sir, are anything but poor.
Do not attempt to contact me under this name; it is a pseudonym, one of many. Do not bother trying to trace me by way of police, either, as you will have little to no success in that regard. My network of informants and associates is far more vast than you can imagine; this will prove quite advantageous if you choose to do business, and disastrous should you choose to make some foolish attempt to have me found out and arrested. (Not only would you not succeed should you engage in such a ridiculous venture, but you should earn my enmity as well, a thing, sir, which would not be wise to invoke.)
You may well be skeptical about my connections. Do not make this mistake. I am well aware of the amour which existed between yourself and the lovely songbird of the Opera Populaire, one Christine Daaé, if I recall correctly. I am also aware that she was seen leaving Paris by hansom in the company of a strange man, and I think you may be very glad to know that I can provide you with their destination, which will perhaps aid you in your search.
If you choose to make use of my knowledge regarding your former fiancée, you will leave no less than 10,000 francs—notes, please, as I do not accept cheques—in an unmarked envelope on the doorstep of 117 Rue Ville and knock three times, at precisely 11 o'clock on Tuesday the 29th. You will have received this letter on the 23rd, which gives you less than one week to make up your mind. If you deposit the money in the correct location on the correct date at the correct time, and it is found to be exactly the quantity I requested, I will contact you again by letter, after which it is your affair to do with the enclosed information what you will. If you lead the police to the aforementioned location, it will gain you nothing, and will prove disastrous for you and your family, as I said. If you do nothing at all, choosing to ignore my offer, then you shall hear no more from me; I shall assume you do not want my services, and I will never attempt or agree to contact you again—even, my dear sir, if after the appointed date and time you happen to change your mind. Therefore, sir, I cannot stress enough that it is of the utmost importance that my instructions be followed with exactness should you wish to accept my services.
Sincerely,
M. Chaubertin
Raoul wanted to laugh aloud, but something about the letter chilled him—a miasma of deadly sincerity seemed to hang over it, and then there was that odd shiver which had traveled up his spine when he had read the words in the company of a strange man.
Somewhat against his better judgment, he showed the letter to Lenore. She drew her brows together, her nose wrinkling a little. "10,000 francs!" she exclaimed. "I think you're being played for a fool. Raoul, you don't seriously mean to follow these instructions, do you? Even if he is telling the truth—don't you realize what it means, for your little Swede to have left in the company of another man? What possible good could come to you of pursuing her?"
"Perhaps it was not of her own volition," Raoul said in a strained voice. "Perhaps she was forced to do so."
"By whom?"
Something in his stomach felt cold and leaden.
"I must find out," he said. "I must. It may be nothing, but—"
"Oh, what foolishness," snapped Lenore. "Raoul, think! 10,000 francs is not so great a sum, not for us, but even so, we—"
Raoul stared at her. "You see, you're right!" he said. "He could have asked for far more. Which brings up the question—why didn't he?"
Lenore frowned. "What are you thinking of?"
"Lenore—if he were lying, I think he should have made far more fantastic claims, and probably have asked for a far greater sum. This man probably puts a certain price on certain sorts of information—he claims to know that Christine was seen leaving Paris with a strange man, and he claims to know where the hansom was headed, but he makes no claims of knowing the identity of the man, or her precise location at this time. If he were lying, don't you see that he would be an idiot for not making more substantial claims to bait me into giving up my money, or, for that matter, charging a good deal more than 10,000 francs for such information? He writes far too eloquently to be such a fool."
Lenore put a hand to her forehead. "Raoul, even if you are correct—which I doubt—it has been two months—"
"Lenore, this person knows something, and I must follow the trail, if only to make sure that Chr—that Mlle. Daaé truly runs no danger. She was kidnapped by a madman before. He may very well have kidnapped her again. The people and the police combed those tunnels—there was never any news of a body, or an arrest. He is still at large, insofar as we know. I do not think it quite so incredible a stretch of the imagination that he—"
"Raoul," said Lenore, in a long-suffering tone, "why, then, should she have gone off with him without a struggle?"
"He threatened her with my life that night," Raoul said softly, "in that dripping, eerie place. She—" He was about to say put her lips to his to save me, but could not bring himself to say it. The act had been grisly enough—the juxtaposition of her smooth skin and dark hair against the mottled, mangled flesh of a man whose nature was as gruesome and twisted as his appearance—but in addition, Christine had, he knew, done it out of far more than a desperate attempt to save Raoul's neck. She pitied the monster, pitied and—dared he think it?—on some level, worshiped the man, for his diverse talents and his perverse brilliance. Raoul had never spoken of this observation aloud, had never quite dared to bring it up, wanting whatever emotion was buried in the tunnels to remain buried.
Suddenly, brought on by this recollection, a new thought struck him. Was it not only possible that she might have left with that execrable piece of filth, but that, perhaps, she could possibly have done it without coercion?
No. This was a ridiculous notion, one too horrible to contemplate; he felt bile rise in his throat, and the room spun around him. Christine was not capable of leaving him for that grinning, murderous beast. Not willingly. If she had left with someone of her own free will, let it be someone else—dear God, he would have it be almost anyone else. Someone kind, someone ordinary and decent and upright of character, someone who was at least half-deserving of her affections.
And yet, to think…the dreadful paradox of it all was almost too much to bear. Would it not be the most awful parody ever conceived, to be forsaken by Christine in favor of the very demon he had nearly lost his life rescuing her from in the first place? She could not be so low as that, nor could he believe she could be mad enough to run off with a wanted murderer unless she were forced. And yet, this dreadful idea made a kind of terrible, twisted sense—the man had been her teacher, a vaguely godlike figure, the unwieldy instrument which had raised her to new heights in her career. And though she had borne a frightened, disgusted look upon her face whenever she happened to speak to Raoul about the maniac's romantic inclinations for her, of his crazed obsession, of the mad, haunted look in his eyes—Raoul had seen in her own eyes a flicker of something else, as though she secretly relished it. This, too, he had never spoken about, for fear that it had merely been his imagination.
"She would have gone with him that night," he said hollowly, "if it had meant my safety. He let us go, after she—agreed. Something appeared to alter in him; he was—touched, perhaps, by her sacrifice. But I am not so stupid as to believe it was anything but passing—he could not possibly have given her up so easily as that. My God, Lenore, I couldn't have given her up as easily as that, if—"
"You think he may have threatened her with your life again if she did not leave with him?" Lenore inquired, looking at him. He nodded. "It is possible, I suppose—" she said, sounding as though she did not suppose it possible at all, "—but really, dear, I hardly think she would not have left some clue of such in her letter. Did you not say that she claimed to be happy and well, and utterly sure of herself?"
"He may have forced her to write it," Raoul said weakly, still wanting to cling to the idea that, if she had indeed left with the one he feared, it was not of her own volition.
"If she had truly needed your assistance, I rather think she would have managed to insert some sort of plea for help without it being noticed by her captor," Lenore said softly. "And you certainly should have discovered it by now, don't you think?"
"He is damnably brilliant," Raoul muttered. "It might have been difficult to—"
"Raoul, listen to yourself!" cried Lenore, withdrawing her hand, which had rested for a moment on his shoulder. "You are beginning to sound like a madman! Do you not know how besides ourselves we've been, Sabine and I? We worry for you so. If only you would be yourself again and forget that ridiculous little Christine!"
"I cannot possibly be happy while this matter remains unresolved," he said tightly. "I cannot suffer her to be ensconced in terror and deceit. Can you not comprehend this? I cannot ignore her safety. I must make sure!"
Lenore closed her eyes and rubbed at her sinuses with her finger and thumb. "Raoul, if Sabine and I find that you've made off with 10,000 francs—" she said between her teeth.
"You and Sabine do not manage the finances," he retorted. "I may three years your junior and five years hers, but I am still the sole male heir, and quite old enough to be judged the man of the household."
"Then act like one!" she snapped, cuffing him roughly on the head, and angrily swept from the room before he could say another word.
Six days passed. Raoul felt himself growing increasingly skittish, always feeling as though he were being watched. He saw suspicious faces everywhere—a small, ill-favored man with a crooked back; a tall, rotund character dressed in black with a bright-red waistcoat; a youth with shifty eyes, whom he spotted quite often on the Rue Avignon; a woman, dressed in shabby clothing, wearing a floppy hat over tangled locks and bearing a greedy expression.
He was certain he was being spied upon, but could prove nothing; and he remembered well "M. Chaubertin's" warning at taking any action which would alert the police. He wished there were some other alternative, but felt he had no choice but to comply with the man's wishes if he wanted some kind of lead. Unbeknownst to Lenore or Sabine, he had already withdrawn the 10,000 francs three days prior to the appointed day and had kept the notes hidden in an envelope in a locked drawer with a false bottom.
Eleven-o' clock was very close at hand; Raoul hurried out the servants' entrance so as not to be noticed by his sisters. The Rue Ville was not far away; he elected to walk, in case Lenore had instructed the coachman not to accommodate him. At precisely eleven-o' clock, as instructed, he laid the envelope on the door-step and knocked three times.
There was no answer for several moments; he began to think Lenore had been right, that he had indeed been played for a fool. Just as he was about to snatch the envelope up and go, he heard a low, inauspicious voice from inside say, "Leave it."
"M. Chaubertin?" he inquired softly, his mouth close to the door.
"No," said the voice. "One of his associates. Leave the money. You will be contacted shortly by letter."
"Very well," said Raoul, fighting off his unease, and slowly walked away.
Later that same day, one of the house-keepers informed him that a letter had been brought by a young man who, according to the house-keeper, "looked like a chimney-sweep; it was difficult to make out his face for he was all covered from head to toe in soot, except for his hand, which was clean as a whistle. An odder thing I never saw in all my life, monsieur." The letter itself was free of soot, at any rate—Raoul guessed that the "chimney-sweep" had been holding the letter in his clean hand—and had the words M. le Vicomte de Chagny written on it in the same hand as the previous correspondence from M. Chaubertin. He fought off a combination of eagerness and disquiet—he was desperate to know something, but now that the moment had come, he was not at all sure he wished to pursue this matter to its end. Make sure of her safety, he thought over and over, that's all you wish to do. If she is happy and well, that will be the end of it. If she is in danger— His mind would not quite allow him to proceed beyond this point; quite frankly, the idea of facing his foe again made him feel a bit ill, and Raoul was not a cowardly man. The chief reason, however, that his fingers remained frozen in place on the envelope, making no move as yet to ascertain its contents, was the dreadful, paralyzing scenario he hoped against hope was merely a product of his over-active imagination, that of Christine and her freakish suitor eloping together by her own choice. What if it were true? If it were, he did not want to find out. He did not want to know. Knowing would drive him mad, more, if possible, than if he never ascertained her fate at all.
Pondering this for a moment, he closed his eyes, and in one swift movement, took the letter-opener from his desk and savagely sliced the envelope open, grabbing at the paper inside and not heeding the sliver of blood appearing on his left index finger. The pain was an annoyance easily cast aside; he devoured the letter's contents with his eyes as a gourmand would a sumptuous meal.
M. le Vicomte de Chagny,
Greetings, sir! I am most pleased that you have chosen the most preferable route in this little ballet of secrecy, and express my delight that you appear to have a considerable amount of good sense, having made no effort to lead the police to the meeting-place, nor having shirked on time or money as far as my instructions were concerned. (I have, you see, encountered such dullards in the past, who were stupid enough to leave off a few—or a few hundred—francs from the total amount, thinking, perhaps, that I could not count; or arrived one to five minutes late—you take my meaning well enough. Needless to say, I no longer conduct business with any of these individuals.)
And now, to the point, sir. Your Christine was seen leaving Paris by hansom with a strange man, as I mentioned—it is notable, perhaps (and may prove vital to your search), that he was quite tall, entirely clothed in black (complete with a large-brimmed hat), and appeared, from what my associate could discern, to be unnaturally pale of complexion. Your Christine was carrying a large valise with her, and appeared to be wearing traveling garb, of an indistinct color. Her hair was bound up, but it was undoubtedly her; she was seen entering and exiting her former place of residence, and my man was able to get a good look at her face when she passed beneath a street-lamp.
This selfsame associate, who is exceptionally keen of hearing as well as sight (and therefore you see why he is of such inestimable value to me in these sorts of matters), staggered as close to the cab as he could without giving himself away (he was, at the time, pretending to be inebriated, and prior to this had been feigning sleep in a nearby alleyway as the two persons of interest had passed him by), and was able to glean that their most pressing destination was the town of Éperon, fifty miles north of Paris. It should not be too difficult for you to travel there and glean what information you can from the residents; I have no knowledge as to whether this was their final destination, and have had far too many other infinitely interesting little diversions here in Paris and its immediately surrounding areas to go to the trouble of finding out. My network is not so vast that I can deploy my associates to every corner of France, after all, even for such a deliciously puzzling intrigue as this.
I am of the greatest hope that this information will be of service to you.
Sincerely,
M. Chaubertin
His pistol was in good working order. He fingered it for a moment, feeling the elaborate inlay, staring at the engraving To My Son, from His Father the Comte de Chagny. His father, he thought, the man who had stipulated in his will that his son should have to be married before changing his title from "Vicomte" to "Comte" (under normal circumstances, the title would simply have been inherited upon his father's death), would have told him to forget the whole matter—the virtue of a chorus girl was of little consequence to the nobility, even if she had blossomed into an operatic star. Her status was too low, her rank nonexistent—she did not even have the benefit of being "new money," an appellation which belonged to those who had amassed considerable wealth, but possessed no title.
Why was it, he wondered, that those of his class were so unbearably elite, so blinded to the plights of those who did not share their wealth or name? Even his sisters—who were fine women, despite Lenore's tendency to lose her temper, and Sabine's habit of goggling at every handsome nobleman who tipped his hat—had always disapproved of a match between himself and Christine, seeing her as a kind of immoral intruder (a life on the stage, no matter how virtuous, was always prone to gossip, particularly when ensconced in such scandal as Christine's had been), a blight on their good name.
They needn't know of his little excursion—of the real reason behind it, at least. He fully intended to feign a "return to his senses"—to pretend he had some business in the country, something to keep him suitably occupied while he "forgot" Christine. He had no doubt that his sisters would be delighted at this prospect.
M. Chaubertin had not bothered to elaborate on the circumstances of Christine's departure. Even so, Raoul began to see in his mind's-eye Christine's face, her eyes red and her cheeks streaked with exhausted tears, pictured her frantically scanning the streets for someone, anyone, who could help her, saw a long black-clad arm forcing her into the hansom, and imagined a muffled cry. His blood boiled, and his fingers clenched around his pistol, wanting so badly to hear the report of the shot and see blood blossoming on the chest of the one he hated more than the very devil himself. Oh, he had no doubt it was He—too many details of M. Chaubertin's description rang true for it to be coincidence. There was hardly any fear in him now; hatred made him feel very strong indeed, almost invincible. The Phantom would not fare well against bullets, would he? Even quick reflexes would be of little use against a well-placed shot.
And yet…something gave him pause. Was his sister right? Would Christine not have managed somehow, in her good-bye letter, to insert a plea for assistance, or given some clue as to her whereabouts, if she really felt herself endangered? Could she not have managed, perhaps, to sneak a desperate missive to a post-man once she reached her final destination? Unless she were imprisoned under-ground again—this gave Raoul such a rush of bitter, angry bile that he felt for a moment as though he would be sick. Oh, hatred was not always good…it was already beginning to eat at his soul like acid. He had not had ample time for hatred of this caliber in the tunnels beneath the Opera—it had been a stale kind of venom then, mixed with bone-weariness and the overwhelming struggle to survive. All his energy had been diverted to preserving himself and Christine, his mind frantically working some kind of way to get them both away from the madman who had trapped them. Now, however…now, he saw well how hate could destroy a man, make him as twisted in mind and soul as other men were in body and face. Was it worth it, to let it drive him to the same kind of madness which had inspired the Phantom's grisly acts?
But this was different—this sort of hatred had purpose, not simply blind, irrational vengeance. He needed it to lend him strength for a time, while he sought them out and—
Something hit him then, something he had not quite let himself dwell upon, and it made him bite at his lips and utter a low cry. It had been two months since Christine disappeared—this time would not be like the last. Perhaps—oh, it was a desperate perhaps—some miracle had preserved her virtue thus far, but two months—two months! It was a long time for the monster—who, he remembered, had made no secret of his passion for Christine—to keep his desires in check. Perhaps, in a twisted attempt at propriety, she had even been forced into some kind of marriage to justify such ends—Raoul closed his eyes here, and clenched his fist upon the desk. It did not matter—he might be too late for that, but he could still liberate her from such unwanted affections. If indeed they were unwanted.
That last thought slithered into his mind like the Serpent in the Garden, and he angrily shoved his pistol into the waistband of his trousers in response.
You ought to think of that, his mind whispered. What if she is happy, of all things, with that insufferable maniac? What will you do then?
This was preposterous—unthinkable—and yet—what if she were happy? It was a possibility—however remote—and it bore dwelling on, if only to make himself prepared—
He could not think on it now. Plenty of time to pain himself with those sorts of considerations later—he needed to inform his sisters of his imminent departure, plant the seed in their minds that he was going on business, make travel arrangements for—he glanced at the letter from M. Chaubertin—Éperon, wherever that might be.
A/N: The decision to return to Raoul and tell this chapter from his point of view was a long time in coming and involved a very evolutionary struggle on the part of the plot; most early drafts of this chapter involved a bunch of sexual encounters and/or arguments/fights between Erik and Christine, but I realized after a while that it just wasn't working (at least, not at the moment)—I had to move the plot along somehow and do something different, not just let it stagnate with the same old thing chapter after chapter, and every time I tried to do it from Christine's POV, I failed miserably. There were just too many hang-ups. I even toyed with a scene from Étienne's POV where Erik grudgingly asks him for advice about women—it was a really funny scene, but again, it just ended up not working and being too random, so I scrapped it. When I finally hit on doing something from Raoul's perspective, everything just seemed to click into place—particularly after I made the decision to do the entire chapter from his perspective. (When I started with the Raoul idea, I tried to split it up and write half with Raoul, half with Christine, but that ended up not really working, either.) I remember that a great reviewer mentioned really enjoying the fact that this is "Christine's story," which definitely is what I set out to write when I started this whole tale, and also why I've tried so hard to only confine it to her POV up to this point. Doing a "meanwhile" chapter with Raoul, however, made me feel unbelievably more free and creative—so many possibilities for the plot seemed to open up once I allowed myself to do this, so I'm very glad I did. Making Raoul a major player in the upcoming plot, rather than something of a forgotten cipher (which is how he started—I literally had next to no intention of having him in any other chapters than the prologue, aside from being mentioned in Christine's reflections and conversations) really seemed to pump some badly needed life into this story, and frankly, I'm pretty excited about all the ideas that have sprung into my head as a result.
I doubt seriously that I'll tell the story from any other character viewpoints unless absolutely necessary for the plot—I still want this to remain largely Christine's story, and even Raoul, despite having managed to get a whole chapter all to himself, isn't going to become anything like a Kayesque counterpoint; I'm not planning on it, at any rate. We'll see what happens; my stories have always tended to take me in vastly unpredictable directions. They have a kind of fluid life of their own, and if I try to force my will on them, they fight back! (This may sound asinine and even a little crazy to anyone who hasn't experienced it, but I assure you, it does happen. You just get these feelings, as a writer, these totally unexplainable feelings, and if you follow them in the right direction, they can take you to places you never imagined. If you ignore them, you usually suffer stagnation and writer's block—or if you do manage to get something written, it's generally not up to your usual par. There's nothing schizophrenic about it; it's just part of the mystery of writing.)
Incidentally (in case any of you are wondering), the decision not to make Raoul's older brother Philippe a character in this tale was mainly for the reason that I felt it would introduce a far too unstable element to the plot-Philippe, I felt, would have made it his personal mission to get Raoul married off and perhaps even psychiatrically evaluated, and he wouldn't have been nearly so easily fooled as Raoul's sisters into thinking Raoul was going into the country on business (since whatever business Raoul had would likely have been his business as well, or at least of personal interest)—nor would he have been able to ignore the withdrawal of 10,000 francs from the family finances, since he would likely be the one controlling and managing them. Philippe has always struck me as a vastly prying individual, and as he's not present in the musical, I didn't feel a pressing need to include him in the story (despite the fact that I have included several Lerouxian elements, such as Mme. Valerius, that aren't present in the musical—or, in the case of Étienne, an entirely original character. Those are simply to enhance the flavor. A believable representation of Philippe in this particular story would not, I believe, have added a very good flavor—he very likely would have been the unnecessary ingredient that spoiled the broth).