Officer Stephen Marcus bit his lip so as not to laugh incredulously.
He stood with his other three associates, along with Chief Inspectors Darius Shahzad and Cedric Berger, in the underground level that made up their branch of Paris's secret police headquarters. Above ground stood the front offices of the police's central postal services, an adequate cover for their operations. The Girys and the Phantom were whisked through the crowd of bustling postal workers and down the winding staircase to the present establishment.
Their presence was the cause of Marcus's fight to staunch his laughter.
His fellow associates were Jacques Chauvet, a former Navy captain from the Caribbean whose infectious laugh and casual manners made him a favorite at clubs and parlors despite his dark skin and accent; Henrik Heglin, a Swiss transfer with wild red whiskers who was never more serious than when at a game of cards; and David Perrin, a nondescript young lieutenant whose thin, bland appearance covered a genial soul. He was Marcus's closest friend on the force, despite their stark differences in temperament and background.
For Perrin came from a respectable upper middle-class family of war heroes and policemen. He'd worked steadily for a few years in the Surete, until it was discovered by Shahzad's sharp eye that the young man possessed the uncanny ability to seemingly sink into the background and disappear, making others forget or at least dismiss his unimpressive presence. Thus, he'd been recruited to the secret police, and proved so far invaluable as just another face in the crowd, whose ears were always open to secrets a more notable figure would never be privy to.
Marcus, however, came from rougher origins.
Born to a French carnival barker and English trapeze artist, the young Marcus found himself homeless and in effect orphaned at the age of eleven. His father and the carnival left his pregnant unwed mother stranded in Paris, and his harried mother tried raising him on her own as a "laundress." The bastard boy took his mother's own family name. Her fits of temper and self-pity were so exhausting to mother and son both that when she passed away of some form of consumption and conniption fit his eleventh year, her young son felt only a lingering regret but mostly relief.
He took out to the street and became a rather successful pick-pocket. By age fourteen, he was a very successful pick-pocket. By age sixteen, he'd moved on to robbery and cons. By age nineteen, he was a crucial member of an underground Parisian gang. He became an "Apache" of the first order.
He was not a terribly conventionally handsome man, but there was a dark, rustic look about him that often appealed to the ladies. He had an angular face and a hawk nose broken in the middle, making it veer off rather quizzically to the left. His eyes were of a disarmingly pale blue-green shade in a weather-beaten, tanned face framed by long dark brown hair. His smile was crooked and frightening, and all the more alluring to adventurous ladies because of it. As for height, he was only about average, but his thick broad shoulders and narrow waist made him seem quite a bit more than that.
It was the result of a raid on his gang that led him to Darius Shahzad. The glum, rebellious Marcus was sitting whistling and punchy in a holding cell when suddenly the door to his cell opened and standing before him was rather an austere looking toff (as his cockney mother would have said) with a fuzzy cap and penetrating but lazy hazel eyes. The man smiled oddly and asked if Marcus was looking to reduce his sentence.
Some twelve years later, and here he was. Respectable now, practically. With his natural charm and swagger, he was able to maintain his underground connections to help him feed information to his new employers. Now thirty-two years of age, his dark hair was now cut a respectable length, his face shaven, and his clothes fashionable but properly somber for his profession. If it weren't for the mischievous wild gleam in those pale eyes, combined with that arresting face and build, there would exist little evidence that the clean-cut man ever knew a less than comfortable and respectable life.
He'd arrived back in Paris along with the de Chagnys, having trailed the couple not long after they fled Paris for Perros-Guirec. He'd gathered no real personal opinion of the adoring couple, of the melancholy cast of the brunette bride or the masculine worry of the blond groom. He'd only faithfully reported their movements to Darius and then returned when the Persian officer said it was time to. Darius wanted to be alone at the inquest, so this was the first time Marcus beheld the Giry women, not to mention the infamous opera ghost.
He and the other men had wheedled Darius and Cedric for more information about the three after their confrontation in the lair (Marcus was bitter he'd not been asked to accompany them). Always with an eye on the ladies, Marcus was especially curious about the young mademoiselle who'd volunteered to join their ranks.
Cedric was still recovering from that confrontation's results and he blustered and blowed more than even usual. When asked point-blank what the young dancer was like, he replied with one choice word: "Foolhardy!"
When asked the same question, a queer look of surprise and admiration appeared in Darius's eyes as he thought of Meg. "Still waters run deep," he murmured.
From those rather disparate descriptions, Marcus anticipated the most enticing, secretive mademoiselle. Perrin heard through his opera-loving mother that she was very pretty, after all.
When the three appeared, two met Marcus's expectations. Madame Antoinette Giry – birth name Anahid Najami – looked exactly as he imagined a ballet mistress with a shady past should: imperious, pallid, and with a belittling but wise look in her eyes. Her erect carriage increased her aloof air and she wore a black almost as lifeless and stark as her hair wound tightly and severely around her head in a braid.
And the Phantom! He hovered behind the group, a good three inches taller than any other man in the room. His cloak's collar was up, obscuring most of his face along with the brim of his fedora. There was just a sliver of his trademark porcelain-white mask visible, along with a penetrating, rich brown eye that gazed morosely out at the assembly. Quite the cover of a penny dreadful mystery. Appropriate.
But the girl, on the other hand! This was why Marcus bit back his laughter.
She did not meet his expectations.
He expected a sleek young serpent of a girl, with a languid smirk and narrowed eyes. Weren't all dancers on the make? Flirtatious articles out to cut throats to get ahead? Combine that drive with someone adventurous enough to sneak around with an opera ghost and volunteer herself as a spy, and Marcus expected someone with a dangerous, powerful presence dripping with sensuality.
What he saw instead was quite the opposite.
She was a very petite girl dressed in an outdated muslin gown of faded pink that didn't fit very well, the skirt seeming to swallow her. Taking off her bonnet, she revealed a long thick mane of bouncing reddish-blonde curls, tied – and this Marcus inwardly groaned at – in a rather ridiculously big white ribbon.
Her little gloved hands were folded quietly in front of her, and her large green-gray eyes (there was evidence of Persia at least in her features, Marcus thought with a little satisfaction) were wide and all innocent wonder as she surveyed the room and listened to Darius's introductory words.
She was Little Bo Peep more than Salome. The way her quick head darted this way and that, over her shoulder, above her, at this angle, at that angle, she was far more a hopping lark than a lascivious bird of prey.
She was a beauty, Marcus gave her that, with those large almond-shaped eyes, pouty lips, and that softly curious expression. But it was a fair, innocent beauty that did not appeal to him very much: he preferred his ladies dark and wicked-looking. A bit like himself.
There was also a vaguely elfin air about her that Marcus wasn't sure he liked.
His eyes trailed lower to take in her figure. He was a little more satisfied there. Though she was shorter than was his usual taste, she was shapelier than he expected a dancer to be. Speaking of her profession, he almost completely lost his composure when he saw her little feet in their slippers: the girl was actually standing in some sort of ballet position, he was sure of it! That combined with her straight posture gave her a very quizzical air: like a straight-backed flamingo folding its legs out gracefully but ludicrously.
Curious, curious girl!
Meanwhile, Cedric was droning on in that officious way of his. Darius had finished giving them the brief history of their establishment in his sonorous voice, of how Cedric was in reality a representative of the Deuxieme Bureau (to whom their branch reported directly), and that this office was key in scouting out future threats to the French government. Now this very Cedric was introducing the operatic trio to each officer in attendance.
Chauvet's eyes twinkled in an avuncular way as he bowed to Meg (he had three daughters and the eldest was about the Giry girl's age), Heglin briskly shook each hand without removing his pipe from his mouth, and Perrin's was agape in wonder as he nodded at the Phantom. One wouldn't think so looking at his bland countenance, but Perrin was addicted to all tales of the opera ghost and was most eager to meet him.
"…And this is our man on the streets, Monsieur Stephen Marcus." Cedric said, indicating Stephen. With that flashing smile, Stephen bowed exaggeratedly, glancing up particularly at the ladies. He, too, was fascinated by the Phantom, but not even the ghoulish opera ghost could trump the fascination women of all ages held for Stephen Marcus. "A pleasure," Marcus said.
He winked so quickly you could have missed it.
Meg Giry apparently did not. But instead of smirking coolly as the image of her he'd conjured earlier would have, or blushing and looking away as the innocent reality suggested, she only tilted her head, increasing her resemblance to some woodland bird. Their eyes met for the first time. There he did indeed see innocence, and her bee-stung lips were parted in a circular shape.
He was on the verge of somewhat irritably dismissing her as a standard ingénue with wringing hands except he saw a spark there in her big eyes that was…livelier than he expected in an insipid damsel. Alert.
As Cedric droned on, Marcus spied her making eye contact with the Phantom. Stephen could garner no information from that fathomless brown eye of the Phantom's. It was morose and empty, but his sleepy gaze focused on the dancer as she asked him something with that lively gaze of hers.
At last Marcus saw him slowly raise one long tapered finger to his face in a subtle shushing gesture.
And so the girl Meg put on the pretense of listening a bit more. Marcus saw that little foot of hers tap anxiously.
Then as Cedric was about to bring up how the king himself had once deigned to visit the establishment, the little ballet girl could keep it in no longer. "Pardon me," she said. Her voice was much like her image: small, pert, and unprepossessing, but not without a guileless sort of charm. "I do not mean to speak out of turn," here she gave a nervous glance to her censorial-looking mother, "But what exactly do you think this Count of yours has been up to? The papers have been so vague. Something like…robbery?" A bright blush suffused her face, and Stephen believed it was because the thought of such wickedness made the frail girl tremble.
In reality it was a sign of embarrassment: Meg felt sure robbery was too inadequate a word for such a notorious figure.
She sensed her directness did not go over too well in this den of spies, so she blushed some more and blurted out, "Not that I…want to rush anyone. To tell us, that is. Only…only…" she shrugged in confusion. "That is why we are here?" Her voice raised to a squeak on the last word, making it a shrill sort of question.
Far from offending anyone, the girl's earnest eagerness brought a spark of amusement to the dim room with its dark, sparse furnishings. Even her mother's face held fondness as she looked at her flushed daughter.
"Don't worry, ma chere," Chauvet said with a kind smile. "Once our good Monsieur Shahzad starts in on the topic of the Count you cannot get him to stop." He raised a chummy eyebrow at the monsieur in question. "Correct, mon capitan?"
Shahzad only smiled back and inclined his head.
Marcus did admit the smile of relief on Meg's face – surely they wouldn't be so pleasant if she truly had talked out of turn, she was thinking – was quite lovely. He could not recall the last time he'd seen a girl with dimples.
"Well?" Each officer in the room was surprised by the chill that ran up their spine as the Phantom's ghostly tenor voice spoke for the first time. "Shall we get on with it then?" That one brown eye was still all that was visible.
A moment to absorb the shock, then Cedric nodded to Darius, who proceeded to describe the Count in question.
"Robbery, extortion, fraud…the man is not only a menace, but he's a rare character who combines a shallow disposition with a sort of cunning intelligence. I've been after him off and on for nearly ten years. Each time I thought I was on to him, he'd disappear. Rumors would abound a jealous husband finally laid him to rest in a duel, or that a wronged associate took revenge and dumped his corpse in the sea. But then months or years later, he'd reappear – new name, new style, new papers – all airtight – but nonetheless, each time it's him."
He proceeded to explain in detail a few of his more memorable crimes: convincing an aging nobleman he was his long-lost son, thus enjoying the nobleman's vast estate and making off with half his inheritance after his death and just before the authorities intervened; the London bank heist that almost put a duke in jail under false accusations; the time he eloped with a Russian princess and the next morning the girl turned over to find her pearl necklace and diamond rings vanished along with her erstwhile groom.
Every once in a while a contemptuous snicker would escape from the still form of the Phantom, again chilling those assembled. The Giry mother's dark sad eyes only dimmed with each new tale of corruption.
Meg Giry, however, was enraptured. Her lips were pursed and her eyes were so focused on Darius that Marcus got the strange impression that they would burn right through him. She was reminiscent of a previously sweet and simple pampered kitten who sees a mouse or a fly for the first time, and there in the kitten's stance is the wildcat on its first prowl.
Darius finished his tale. "…And then we trailed him here, to Paris. I couldn't be more delighted. For the first time he's where my team is. But his damn papers!" Meg was shocked: this Darius Shahzad was such a serene sort of figure; yet this Count had him swearing! "A master forger! Not to mention he's always been so careful as to not leave behind any sort of incriminating evidence. But he's our man." Darius's eyes blazed. "He's our man."
Meg swallowed and prepared to ask what they could do when her mother spoke for her. "After all, I can't see what possible help we could be."
"Mother," Meg hissed, embarrassed again.
And Marcus had to stifle another laugh.
Heglin lit his pipe and perched on the edge of the desk. "We've grilled one of his former girls, someone who was so close to him that he left her behind, trying to hush her up with money. She spoke to us, though." If that were the case, Meg wondered why Heglin glanced mischievously at that Marcus man, who affected a sheepish look but was obviously trying not to laugh again. "Anyway," Heglin went on, crushing his match in a soot-covered little plate. "According to her, he recently obtained a copy of incriminating papers from some high-ranking official in the French government. He's holding them for blackmail. However, he's a smart one, and is biding his time. Were he to reveal them now, he'd only expose his own crimes as well: apparently he himself is mentioned in the pages, his crimes neatly outlined. If we were to recover them from him before he had a chance to think his way around that fact, we could have him, and save our government a little bit of embarrassment at the same time."
"But the official involved," the Phantom's velvet tenor spoke, "He'd face no repercussions, of course?" Hatred and contempt oozed out of his words.
Heglin only shrugged, hands out.
Marcus spoke for the first time. "We are not heroes, monsieur. Madame, mademoiselle. We are employees like everyone else. We work for our superiors; in this case, the government. We are their agents, not righters of wrongs."
Meg looked down at her feet.
Cedric exhaled angrily at Marcus's callous directness but Darius intervened. "Monsieur Marcus has a cynical but not inaccurate outlook. We are officers of the law. Law is not infallible, but it is our mistress."
Meg glanced up to her mother. There was no surprise there, just rueful understanding. "And what," Madame Giry repeated, "Do you envision us doing in this circumstance?"
"Well, speaking of mistresses" – Marcus began flippantly.
Perrin did not let him finish and spoke over him hurriedly. As always, Perrin came to his rescue when Marcus verged on going too far. "Well, you see, Madame, the Count is quite fond of society and the arts. He adores the opera, as your daughter has observed." Nervous little nod to Meg. "So…well…." Now it was Perrin's turn to blush.
Darius cut bluntly to the truth. "And what he likes even more is girls. Beautiful young girls." His gaze rested on Meg.
Her eyes widened as the meaning penetrated. "Oh? Oh!"
For a moment she didn't take in her mother's fiery rebuttal to what was just implied, or the way Erik stiffened behind her. She felt a little faint while at the same time she was violently aware of how fast her heart was beating.
In truth she'd never thought of herself much in a…a…romantic light. She'd always busied herself so much – too much – in the romantic lives of others. She'd lived vicariously through Sorelli narrating her various affairs, through Piangi and Carlotta's turbulent but still loving relationship, and most of all through the happy conclusion to Raoul and Christine's courtship.
But as for herself? When she thought of her future, she supposed she saw herself vaguely as one of those chipper, active spinsters who finds a nice little cottage somewhere – after she'd retire, of course. Not that Meg ever really wanted to retire.
But now this! She, herself, a tantalizing siren? How ridiculous! But…well…she did tell Darius she'd do whatever was asked….
However, one thing was certain: she would not go to bed with anyone. Not for the police. Not for anyone.
Marcus was intrigued by the queer fire that settled into the Giry girl's eyes. Her already straight posture grew somehow stiffer, prouder. She lightly touched her mother's arm, halting the heretofore stoic lady's venomous words about the arrangement. "Mother, please. I'm not going to…let things get that far. But I've played the flirt a few times already in the opera, so I can keep on doing that, only in real life." She turned to Darius. "Please, monsieur. If I can find out what you need without…without going as far as you imply, certainly that's all right with you?"
"And how," the man Marcus interjected, "Do you plan to accomplish that, mademoiselle?"
She shrugged surprisingly easily. "It's all a matter of finding wherever he's hidden those papers, correct? I am sure there are ways to do that without compromising my virtue, monsieur."
"We'll see," Marcus said under his breath, staring up to the ceiling.
"Let's not get too ahead of ourselves," Cedric said. "First of all, we need to capture the Count's attention. Mademoiselle," he said to Meg. "Like it or not, you are going to serve as our bait. And what better way than to star in the next ballet?"
"The next ballet?" Meg frowned. "But who knows when that will be?"
"I believe your mother can tell us that," Darius said, glancing at Madame Giry.
The dance mistress, still bristling, answered reluctantly. "Before we were called down to the lair by Messieurs Shahzad and Berger," she said coldly, looking at the two, "The managers were informing me that we will open the new season with a ballet. We're still unable to put together an opera just yet. We still need to find replacements for Signor Piangi, La Carlotta, and Christine, and besides, the managers don't want to remind audiences too much of what happened the last time an opera played."
"What's the ballet going to be?" Meg asked quickly, her eyes alight with a different curiosity now.
"A new one," Madame Giry said carelessly. "By Pierre Robard."
Those green-gray eyes were wide open now, accompanied by a gasp. "Pierre Robard! But…but I thought he'd retired! To Italy, wasn't it? Or was it Greece?"
"It was Italy," Giry said rather snappishly, as if her darling daughter was a gnat distracting her with its inopportune buzzing. "But he's been back for the past few years. Writing. And now he's ready to produce what he's said is truly his last ballet."
"Well, what's it called? What's it about?"
Marcus did chuckle now at her youthful forgetfulness: it was as if mother and child were alone, instead of in the middle of a station full of spies. How quickly the young girl's enthrallment transferred from one channel to another!
"La Belle et la Bete. From the children's story."
Meg's smile of wonder was radiant. Beauty and the Beast was one of her very favorite fairy tales growing up. She remembered sitting mesmerized in her tutu with the other little girls backstage as her mother finally relented after a long rehearsal and read from the story's pages. As her mother narrated in her low voice, suddenly the dark backstage became a misty corridor in a black castle, and beneath lurked the beast….
Erik's smooth voice interrupted her reverie. "It is fortunate you obviously enjoy the tale, mademoiselle, seeing as you'll soon star in it."
Any other time hearing such words would have brightened her mood even more. Instead she felt only a dull thud in her chest.
Her mother articulated why. "Gentlemen, I absolutely refuse to allow Meg's career to advance this way. I've always removed myself from the casting process for roles she's auditioned for. Meg has never received any partiality from me, and she never will from anyone else. She will earn her career on her own merits, nothing more."
"But Madame," Cedric began.
The grim lady only drew herself up and stared disdainfully at those assembled. "This is non-negotiable, along with the sordid role you envision her playing outside the ballet."
Meg fidgeted a bit. For the first time she felt a little self-conscious about her mother speaking for her. Licking her lips slightly and clearing her throat, she said, "I…I have a feeling everything will work out just fine, Mother. I suppose I simply ought to audition better than I ever have before."
"You might be forced to," Darius replied. "For you see, my dear, even if your mother were inclined to cast you, the decision does not rest with her alone. Monsieur Reyer, a few stage managers, and Monsieur Robard himself are involved in the casting process. And they, of course, must not know anything of our arrangement. However, if worse came to worse, Messieurs Andre and Firmin could overrule them. But I'd hate for it to come to that." His eyes twinkled at Meg. "Wouldn't you, mademoiselle?"
Meg returned his conspiratorial glance. She raised her head confidently. There was a shine to her eyes, something true and honest that Marcus was a bit taken aback to see: courage.
The queer surprise that he'd seen in Darius's face before was now in Stephen Marcus's as he gazed at Meg Giry.
The Phantom saw that look, and an odd chill shot straight through his breast.