Author's Note: Major thanks to MarylinKC for continuing support. I look forward to your comments.

The Canvas

Within hours of dawn breaking over the city of Paris, a knock at the door seized Meg's heart in the perpetual state of anxiety she found herself feeling ever since…

She did not allow herself to finish the thought. Instead, she rose from her seat at the small kitchen table where third and fourth chairs were almost always empty now and cinched the sash of her robe tight before brushing a kiss to the top of Helene's head. As she neared the door Meg peered out the small side window to her caller, her hand curling around the head of her mother's old cane.

On the stoop stood an older man with thinning dark hair, clad in a jacket where the shade of purple was so dark that it was nearly black, and tan slacks. The brimmed hat was neatly held in his hands already. Grudgingly, she made sure the security chain was in place before cracking the door open to the limit of that chain. "Yes?"

The man offered a tight smile as he regarded her warmly. "Madame Corbin?" he asked and she gave a fraction of a nod. "I am Inspector Herbert Petrie with the Judiciaire, I was hoping to speak with you in light of recent events."

Meg swallowed hard but never the less closed the door enough to unlatch the security chain after Inspector Petrie showed her his badge since he was not in uniform. She led him the parlor where she motioned for him to take a seat on the worn sofa. "Can I get you something? Water? Tea?" she asked solemnly.

"No, thank you. I'm sure my presence here is troublesome enough," Petrie spoke softly as he settled into the sofa and set his hat down on the seat beside him.

Meg pulled her robe a bit tighter and slowly settled into her late husband's favorite chair. "I expected someone would eventually come knocking sooner than later."

"Ah yes," Petrie commented as he pulled a note pad and pencil from inner pocket of his coat. "You've gone through questioning before, as I recall."

"Excuse me?" she asked with rising brows, surprised.

"Yes," Petrie began with warmth in his soft cadence. "You were still Meg Giry then, and I had considerably more hair."

Meg's brows furrowed a moment as she scanned over the man again, subtracting the years the best she could. He was vaguely familiar to her. Perhaps marginally heavier, his round face more lined with time, and dark hair thinner with more streaks of silver running through it than all those years ago. "You were one of the Inspectors after… After everything, at the Opera."

He offered a small smile, "Yes."

"I'm surprised you would remember, after all these years."

"Hmm… yes, though you could say I cheated a bit," Petrie held up his notebook as he spoke. "Though, I will admit that case has always intrigued me and never quite…left me either."

"Many of us could say the same," Meg offered softly as she tucked a stand of her black hair back behind her ear as she relaxed more into Auguste's chair. "In your profession, I imagine some things never quite leave you."

"You are right in that. I have a feeling that this is going one of those cases."

Meg looked down and her hands folded in her lap. "It would be for me, if I were in your stead."

"I have little doubt of that," Petrie continued to use a disarming tone. "What do you know of what happened the night of February 17th, with the de Chagny family?"

"Only what I have read in the papers."

"What precisely have you read, Madame Corbin?"

"That the de Chagny home was found in smoldering ruins with Raoul's body and those of their staff. Then that Christine and Charles were missing until they found Christine's body three days ago now, but no details were given. Also, that Charles is still missing," her eyes watered in earnest over it, though she was careful in her wording. Although she knew the answer anyway, she asked the next question as to not outright betray herself. "Has there been any updates on finding Charles? I can hardly bear thought of not knowing what's become of him," Meg shook her head, remember the agony of what she knew before receiving that note from Erik and letting it play across her features.

"I'm sorry, no. Nothing that I am at liberty to say at this time," Petrie's hand went back into his jacket's inner pocket and withdrew a handkerchief which he held out to her.

Meg graciously took it, dabbing her eyes.

"You were good friends with Christine and the de Chagnys?"

"With Christine more than Raoul. We were both an only child, and considered ourselves akin to sisters through the years. When my daughter Helene was born," she began with a fleeting smile at a fine Sunday tea they had at the de Chagny Chateau years ago, "We had secretly allowed ourselves to imagine that we could become actual sisters if Charles and Helene might become sweethearts and marry. Silly things, but it helped keep the light in our day."

"Were there dark days?"

This gave Meg pause as she considered the thought, wanting to assist the Inspector the best she could without risking too much. "No. Not in the conventional sense of the word at least. It seemed to me that there was always something of a cloud that hung over her ever since her time at the Garnier."

"Why do you think that is?" Petrie question as he watched her more than he took notes.

Meg shook her head. "I'm not sure, she would never tell me what troubled her. In good company she was bright as ever, but there were times… I don't know how to explain it."

"Try, please? It may be helpful."

Glancing down at her hands again, she sighed. "I want to clarify that what I am about to say is only, a feeling. I have no actual proof or facts, just intuition."

"A woman's intuition is said to be quite accurate in many cases. If she is keeping a clear head that is."

"Yes… to a point anyway. It is more accurate in regards to her own family and children."

"You have my attention regardless."

Meg pursed her lips. "Christine and Raoul were always kind to each other and those in their lives. Sweet, loving, affectionate… but I never… I did not quite believe that they were in-love. At least not in the ways I had seen in other couplings or experienced in my own marriage to Auguste. It seemed a façade to me, a well-played one, but one none the less."

"Why do you think that is?"

"Christine's mind always seemed to wander, and because of it she could tell a wonderful story. But after… everything that happened at the opera, she changed. In the months that followed and more after Charles. At first, I thought it was just because of her pregnancy and the loss of Serena, but as years went on, I would catch sight of her look out a window with her guard down where she just seemed… sad."

Petrie made a few short-hand notes. "Serena? Her daughter?"

Meg gave a nod.

"I was unaware there were any other children."

"There…is and isn't," Meg paused and pursed her lips together as she struggled for the right words. "Charles is the oldest of twins. Serena was delivered with the umbilical around her neck. She did not survive and it about destroyed Christine and Raoul, but especially her. Christine would cling to Charles afterwards like he was the only thing in the world. Only those of us close to them knew of Serena."

"Did Serena's death seem to cause any discourse in the marriage? Often such tragedies can lead to an inability to move on as couple."

"No, Raoul was very compassionate and empathetic to her pain. More than most men of his status, I believe. I guess they decided not to have any more for fear of having another such incident. I do not believe Christine's heart could have handled another loss such as that. I think that Raoul thought much the same as I, in that regard. They were a solid coupling, united in much of their decisions, and he would consult her on whatever obstacle that crossed them and their marriage."

"But you do not think they were in love?"

"Not in love, but they did care about each other deeply. Just not in the way one might consider for a marriage since the revolution."

"Why do you think that is?"

"I have little idea why. Only that it seemed to me, that their marriage more of an arrangement. But as I said, this is only speculative on my part."

"Do you think either of them loved someone else?"

"Not with any authority."

"What about without authority? A ponder that is creeping into the back of your mind, but not so strong that you would be willing to make a wager."

Meg's eyes snapped up to Petrie's dark ones that. "That's what you think, isn't it?"

Petrie sat back a bit with another quick notation made. "So do you, Madame Corbin. This is all a very curious affair that I think stretches back years. Raoul and Christine de Chagny are at a loss for enemies in their lives, and there seems to be one in particular that would have motive for murder to the point of hunting down your friend, unless you can give me name. Jilted lover? An affair, perhaps?"

Meg shook her head. "Christine and Raoul were not like that."

"As far as you know."

"As far as I know, yes."

"I have it on…some authority that Raoul de Chagny did briefly engage with a mistress in the early marriage."

"By whose account?" Meg said eying him, wondering if this was even a true statement.

"I cannot tell you that, Madame."

"I do not believe that for moment. Raoul is not that kind of man, and neither is Christine that kind of woman."

"It can be amazing what is learned… after the fact. Things that you did not think possible for someone to do, has often been proved otherwise once an investigation begins into a death. Particularly a homicide."

Meg did not doubt the Inspector's words for an instant in this regard, but for Christine and Raoul? This was something she was certain of to the point of nearly making that 'wager.' Yet, as she believed this fact of her friend's lives, over the years Meg had come to question just who exactly Christine loved in her secretive heart. The secrets that never seemed to truly fade in the years since the Opera Ghost haunted and terrorized the Palais Garnier. "I am sure that is true, Monsieur Petrie. But I am certain of their integrity in this."

"Very well. Though, if you permit me, I want to discuss a loose theory I have nagging the back of my mind. It's not the full picture as painted by an artist, but it is enough to gain a vague idea of what that artist has in mind."

Meg said nothing, solemnly folding the handkerchief in her hands now.

"On the night of January 7th, 1897, your friend, then Christine Daaé, was abducted from the stage of the Paris Opera in the midst of Faust during scene two of act five – vanishing before everyone with a flicker of the lights as Marguerite pleas for heaven.

"Come the afternoon of January 8th, she returns in the company of Raoul and Monsieur Nadir Khan, all of whom are quite disheveled and perplexingly quiet of what transpired in those lost hours. Raoul, who had been talkative of the Opera Ghost, the Angel of Music, the Phantom of the Opera suddenly falls silent for weeks. That is, until we found the body of Comte Philippe de Chagny on February 11th. He grows chatty again about the deformed man living beneath the Opera, who abducted Christine and nearly killed him and Monsieur Khan, so surely, he killed Comte Philippe. Raoul goes silent come February 15th and onward. Christine was quite evasive on the matter entirely, and would only admit there was a man whose name she would not give us. All she would say was 'it was not him.'"

Meg continued to sit in silence.

"It is almost the same story as the one you, your mother, and Monsieur Khan had told us, Madame Corbin. We know the Opera Ghost is more just a myth that the Palais Garnier has chosen to bury along with operas themselves. As though keeping opera from the stage of an opera house is enough to keep the Ghost away. It is interesting, that even after all that Raoul de Chagny said he had suffered at the hands of this man, he chose not to pursue the case over his brother. Not only that, but everyone seems to have chosen to protect this man from justice for at least Comte Philippe and possibly more."

Still, Meg said nothing even as tears flowed from her cheeks.

"Now, all the de Chagnys are either dead or missing, and as it stands, my only real suspect is whoever the man is behind the Opera Ghost. Do not mistake me either Madame, I do not think this lightly. However, what the papers are not telling you is that Christine's body was discovered in the mortuary. It had been broken into by an expert. The documents there regarding her body were forged, and all we have is a name, LeRoi. My colleagues and suspect that is false of course, but we have reason to believe that this LeRoi and this Opera Ghost is one in the same. Tell me, Madame Corbin, does the name Erik have any meaning to you?"

"No…" she breathed softly.

It was a terrible crossroads to be in as Petrie spoke, and this artist's half-painted picture was disturbingly accurate in the speculation of what was to come. Erik's note to her left her rattled on just who she could trust. Could she even trust Petrie with anything she knew; as vague and unhelpful as it might be? At the same time however, she wanted to them to find Christine and Raoul's murderer.

She did not know Erik. Barely knew him at all beyond him being a fleeting shadow who ultimately, had looked out for her, her mother, and Christine during their time at the opera. For all the things that transpired there, even before the scandal, there were certain things that she was able to grasp about him. If Erik was truly as heartless and cold as the world seemed to think of him, why had he never killed Raoul? Erik had an unhealthy infatuation with Christine, they all knew it. He believed he loved her. As such, it would have been easy for Erik to kill Raoul at the start and claim Christine without competition, so why did Raoul live until now?

Because the Phantom only killed out of measure of self-defense, at least from what little she knew and gleaned from her mother as well as Monsieur Khan. But how accurate was that statement truly? Would Erik kill Christine and Raoul out of frustration ten years on? Was the note he sent a farce?

No, never. Not Christine, not when he had yearned for death for those weeks all those years ago. Then, suddenly regain a reason to live again?

Oh Christine, what did you do then? What haven't you told me?

"All the de Chagnys?" Meg asked after a moment, voice little more than a whisper. "All dead except Charles?"

"No. Roseline de Faure née de Chagny has been missing for some time now, before all these tragedies began falling upon the family.

"Roseline?" Meg repeated under her breath. "Raoul's sister?"

"Yes. Did you know her?"

"No… I think I only briefly met her at their wedding, then…"

"Then what?"

"Then nothing. I had not heard of her since, not a mention or that she was even missing. Not by Christine or even Raoul."

Inspector Petrie's brows now pinned together as he regarded her. "Curious."