Meg did not stop running until she reached her bed, when she skidded to a halt and had to grab her bedpost to keep balance.
She'd scarcely noticed the blur of panicked faces and figures, the horde running this way and that in the aftermath of Piangi's murder and Christine's kidnapping. She'd been so focused on her goal of reaching her bedroom that it was only her years of dance training that kept her from colliding with the frenzied denizens of the opera house as she made her way to the flat.
Panting, she now threw off her pillow and picked up the folded papers beneath.
She squeezed them tightly for a moment, nodding briskly. They're here. Nothing's disturbed them.
Then like a bird hopping from branch to branch, she plopped them down on her bed again and ran to her small closet, flinging open the doors.
She spread apart the cloud of tutus and the few regular dresses she owned.
Behind them was the back of the closet where one of the panels stuck out almost undetectable by the human eye, a flaw in the design.
Meg nudged the plank of wood forward a bit and then reached her hand down until she felt the fabric beneath her fingers. She pulled them through.
Tan breeches, a button-up shirt, and a dark brown vest. Reaching down further, she removed the boots and cap from their hiding place.
She had told her mother a few weeks past that she was sewing something for Christine. In reality, she was adjusting the breeches she snuck from an old stagehand's locker to fit her form.
Hastily now she shed herself of her costume for the opera – bandana, silk skirts, each embedded with gold coins – and transformed immediately from the tantalizing night dancer to the plain but functional uniform of one headed down to hell.
Once she'd finished dressing, she picked up the precious instructions again, re-folding them and clutching them tightly in her hands.
Her breathing sounded odd and hiccuppy in her head, from what she could hear of it over the pounding in her temples. Her eyes were hot and there was a flutter in her chest like a rabbit was thumping its feet against her ribcage.
If this was fear, she swallowed it down.
If she was afraid, she would confront it later, once everyone was safe.
So quick was her changing that the mob was only just starting to organize itself when she emerged. Actors, stagehands, and audience members grabbed lanterns and makeshift weapons, many from the prop room. They started separating into groups. Sharp voices clashed, debating how best to journey to the cellars and reach wherever the madman dwelled. The firemen and police were still harshly blowing their whistles, trying in vain to staunch the growing vigilantism.
Unseen, Meg slipped through the crowd and ran to the nearest dressing room.
That was what she first noticed on the Phantom's map: almost every dressing room had an opening to the cellars in the back of the mirrors.
She closed the door on the hubbub outside. She had no idea whose dressing room she was in, and she took no time to look for any signifiers. Instead she headed directly to the mirror.
She bit her bottom lip so hard it almost bled as her tiny hands strained to pull at the mirror. The Phantom apparently used some sort of hand gestures to make the mirror "disappear" (so his map had claimed), but she had no time to improvise the right movements.
At last, at last the mirror slid open just enough for the slim girl to make her way through.
Alice descended into the darkest Wonderland.
She damned herself right away for only bringing matches, not a lantern. For the first time she consciously felt her panic, as all around her was only black and the ominous drip-drip of water hitting the ground from above. The air was bitingly cool. She felt like she was in a void, a lost dimension in space that was just blackness around her, forever and ever.
She squeezed her eyes tight shut and focused, focused on her breathing.
Then squaring her shoulders, she felt in her pocket for the matchbox.
It would have to do.
Her trembling fingers struggled at first, but at last she was able to light one. And it was with a genuine grin of delight that the first thing her eyes fell upon in the dark corridor was a line of torches against the wall.
Torch in one hand, directions in another, Meg made her long hike down.
A chance witness from another time might have judged her at first as an explorer or an archaeologist, judging by the sure stride and excited curiosity on her face as she discovered a twisting passage way here, a trap door coated in dust there, a small jump into a tunnel there. Remnants of ruined walls from Prussia's shelling fascinated her, as did the occasional hoof print in dust lining the tunnels – the Phantom evidently rode on horseback down here occasionally.
However, there was something too quaint and fawn-like about her movements and her glistening eyes that told the lie of any scientific or anthropologic expedition – there was nothing quite professional or studious about her now.
This figure was still too obviously a child. A brave and beautiful child, but a reckless and naïve child, nonetheless.
Still, she couldn't help her wonder as she took in the underground. She shivered when she passed a wooden plank with what looked like chains attached. She remembered her mother once telling her that during the Paris Commune, very often dissenters were taken here for interrogation.
Her heart broke as she wondered if now it was Christine suffering that way – no, no. Don't think about it. Swallow the panic.
Much like Christine had during the show, Meg made herself block out anything not pertaining to the directions on the page and the steps in front of her. Dimly she heard far off noises of the mob floors above her. If she wanted to survive this ordeal and save her friends, she had to forget them, forget what her mother might think if she discovered her absence, and forget what might await her once she reached her destination. She had to instead see only the directions in her hand, she had only to think about how best to fit herself down the awkward narrow passage to the cellar below.
Of the Phantom's face she thought not at all, consciously or subconsciously. When Christine revealed his deformity onstage, Meg only briefly thought of the disfigured leprous plaster-cast heads Buquet used to try to scare her with. Meg had fought her fear of those ghoulish props and eventually trained herself to feel nothing but indifference for them, so likewise, her only feeling upon seeing the Phantom was a rush of fury at his identity confirmed – and underlying that, a strain of pity.
Nearing the end of her journey she had to leave behind the torch, as the farther she traveled the more she was forced to climb or jump. Luckily and strangely, there was enough bluish light now that she could just make out what she was doing.
She was optimistic that meant the lake was nearby, though she did not mean to cross it.
Although she was not haunted by the Phantom's face, as she made her way deeper and deeper down the labyrinth, there was one other fear concerning him circling her brain:
What to do when she did reach the Phantom's lair.
She…didn't want to hurt him, exactly. Meg didn't want to hurt anyone. She just wanted Christine safe. And anyway, how could the petite ballet girl hurt anyone if she even wanted to? Particularly someone as skilled and violent as the Phantom? She didn't even have a weapon!
So what to do once she saw him, what to say?
"'Monsieur'," she whispered to herself, rehearsing as she struggled opening another heavy trapdoor. "'You've known my mother for many years. She's helped you, I know.'" She hopped down from the trapdoor into a narrow walkway lined by bricks. Her heart pounded as she felt sure she heard the gurgling of water below. The lake was near. "'If you have any regard for her, you will not harm me, and if you harm either of my friends, you'll have to get through me, so' – oh, fiddlesticks, that doesn't make any sense! I'm rambling!" She admonished herself as she hurried along.
She bit her lip again, thinking. She must be more forceful, she decided. She cleared her throat and tried again after glancing down at the directions and taking a right turn where indicated. "'Stop, fiend!'" She tried this time, eyes fiery in the dark. "To get to them, you'll have to get through me first. Go ahead, let's see how tough you really are. Do you dare strike me down, villain?' Oh, that's ridiculous. We're not in a melodrama." She shook her head, almost dislodging her curls from their cap, despairing.
Still, she kept up her quick, decided pace down the narrow passage. She was terribly close now.
Despite her strong words to herself just moments before, she shrieked in terror as a figure surrounded by a bright light suddenly blocked her path.
The figure's face leaned forward.
And like an image from a dream, Meg saw through the blinding light the face of kindly Lajos, the ratcatcher who'd taught her how to pick locks. He held his large lantern up to her, studying her features.
Meg recognized the same gentle but wandering eyes, the same bobbing head that was a little grayer now.
He recognized her and gave her a toothless smile.
She immediately relaxed, ignoring the three rats that scurried past her. She couldn't find her tongue, however, the surprise of his presence rendering her mute.
Like he had to the twelve-year-old six years past, the ratcatcher pat her head again. He laughed a low booming laugh, then he coughed a little.
Meg was about to speak when he spied the papers held tightly in her hand in a protective fist.
Yet when he reached for the papers, some instinct let her release them.
He studied them. The way his eyes unfocused and skipped along the pages, his voice humming oddly, Meg felt sure the man's wandering wits weren't taking anything in.
But just like he'd surprised her with his clear coaching at the wig room door, he surprised her now by smiling sagely and shaking his head. He leaned in to her and lowered the lantern down to a particular section.
"See here, dove? That's the long way and you would have to cross a crumbling precipice to get to the top of the portcullis." He raised his lantern and indicated a narrow opening between two walls Meg hadn't seen before. "Go quick through there. That'll take you right to the top of the portcullis."
Her surprised muteness vanished, and she smiled radiantly. "Thank you," she whispered. She swallowed against an unexpected lump in her throat. "Thank you for everything."
He winked at her. Then his eyes swam away again and he shuffled methodically down the tunnel she'd just traveled down. She heard his deep voice sing an unsteady sort of lullaby to the squeaking horde he led.
Feeling a renewed rush of confidence, she squeezed into the opening. There was only enough room for her to slide down inch by inch, and she felt at any moment like the walls might crush her. She wished wryly that she's thought to tape down her bosom beneath her shirt.
But when she emerged, she indeed found herself at the very top of the portcullis. She gasped at its dizzying length, its elegant build. This must be what the first people who discovered the Grand Canyon in America felt like, she thought in awe. She smelled candles and felt the spray of cold mist on her face, undoubtedly from the lair below. She could see nothing of that lair, and she could hear nothing, either. In fact, had she not been so preoccupied, she might have noticed the quiet below was almost too eerie, too inappropriate given the circumstances.
But still, there was no hesitation in her heart now, no doubt. Somehow she knew, felt it in her bones that she could help. She would do whatever it took to save them – Christine, Raoul…maybe even the Phantom. At least, she could try to reason with the man, before the mob's justice tore him apart.
Somehow she knew her mother wouldn't have joined Raoul all the way. That ingrained aloofness and belief in keeping to oneself would have stopped Antoinette Giry from fully confronting the Phantom.
And so Meg prepared to climb down the long gate by herself, with only her determination and faith as allies.
She did not see the quiet couple down below on the lake, rowing away in the gondola.