242A/N: Thank you for the reviews! : ) Loved reading your thoughts on this!
And now...
Previously: Erik woke days after the fire to find Mme. Giry his uninvited guest. After learning/remembering what happened and unable to search for Christine himself, due to his weakness and injuries, he orders Mme. to do so, concerned for Christine's welfare...Fearful of discovery, Christine escapes the church where she has taken sanctuary, after seeing gendarmes there. Near the destroyed boarding house, she encounters Jess, who tells her Monsieur de Ranier was killed the night of the fire. Horrified, Christine walks away in a tearful daze...
XIX
.
"Do you think she's alive?"
"Of course she's alive, you dolt! See how her lashes are flickering? And her cheeks are rosy, not pale like a corpse or a ghost."
"You ever seen a ghost, Jareth? Old Hans says you can see clear through them. They're misty-like - and corpses are blue, like Maddie Ferndale was when they found her near the river…"
"Hush, Giles, she's waking up!"
Behind heavy eyelids, Christine sensed orange light flicker, relentlessly beckoning her from slumber. She opened her eyes to see the silhouette of leafy branches wave overhead, the sun brightly shining beyond them - when suddenly two faces loomed in her vision and directly above her.
"Oh!" she half gasped, half cried.
The faces bobbed away and she swiftly sat up - to see two lads near her in age, perhaps a bit younger than Christine and kneeling beside her. Dressed in workman's clothes of trousers, shirtsleeves and suspenders, they had the same pale green eyes, one with light hair, one with brown.
"Pardon, mademoiselle, we didn't mean to give you a scare," the dark haired boy said and laid a hand to his chest. "Allow me to introduce myself. I am Jareth, the smart one, and this is my younger brother Giles."
"Smart? You're the one that calls a corpse pale and not blue."
"And I'm the one who gets the best parts."
"Just because you think you can act better doesn't make you smarter."
The one called Jareth ignored his brother's last comeback and looked at Christine.
"Are you alright, mademoiselle? Are you lost?"
Christine glanced down at the carpetbag she had used for a pillow and the violin case she had hugged to her breast all night as she cried herself to sleep. Recalling the reason, having learned the terrible news with regard to the shocking demise of her strange, dear friend, she shook her head miserably.
The brothers shared a look then turned to her again.
"Can you speak?" the fair-haired one called Giles said, then in an undertone to his brother, "Maybe she's a mute."
"I'm not lost," she near whispered. "Am I trespassing?"
Jareth smiled and Giles laughed. "If you are, then so are we."
He pointed behind her and she turned her head to look over her shoulder, surprised to see a caravan of covered wagons in the distance of an open field blanketed with red poppies, several men and women milling about the area they had claimed.
She again regarded the boys. "Are you gypsies?" she asked warily, recalling what horrid things her Angel had penned in his journal about that tribe.
This time both boys laughed. "Worse - we're thespians!"
She felt another wave of surprise - as well as a flicker of camaraderie. Thespians: a breed of people she understood, since so recently, the entirety of her life, really, she had been one of them. Yet, with all that occurred in Paris, even if it did seem a world away, she knew to be cautious and not reveal too much about herself.
"Is that your fiddle?" Giles asked.
Protectively she drew the case close to her bosom. The boys did not seem dangerous but she knew nothing about them. For all she knew they, like those gypsies her Angel wrote about, were also sly thieves.
"It was my papa's violin."
"And do you play?" Jareth queried.
"A little. I have been taking lessons from a great teacher," she said wistfully, the echo of those words remembered in describing her Angel. Monsieur de Ranier had also played an important role in her life, brief though it had been.
Two exceptionally gifted men, both her maestros in music, both with whom she'd felt a strong attachment toward and tragically lost… perhaps even having come to love both men.
Her Angel had called her fickle -
To be so drawn to another, so shortly after losing him, he must be right.
Raoul had called the Phantom a curse, a blight on society …
Yet perhaps she was the curse.
Through all of what happened, Christine had come to a decision never again to invite love and romance into her life - as those girlish and idealistic notions, aided by the dazzling backdrop of the pageantry of her debut, had led her to do at the Opera House. To find love and lose that love was much too painful, and she wished no further ill will to befall anyone.
She had thought she loved Raoul, had come to love her Angel, began to feel its pull with the Monsieur...
Never again.
As she brooded over the past, the brothers shared another look, a nod, and the eldest stood to his feet, holding out his hand.
"You must be hungry, mademoiselle. You are welcome to take a meal with us. Giles and I have been fishing since dawn and caught us quite a catch."
Giles held up a string of fish that had been lying on the ground behind him as though to persuade her.
Her belly twisted in hunger. She could not recall the last substantial meal she'd taken - likely with Monsieur de Ranier - and the lads did seem kind…
She deliberated another moment, then with a nod gave him her hand, and he assisted Christine to her feet. She held fast to her violin case, but before she could bend to collect her carpet bag as well, Jareth grabbed it. He did not appear ready to run off with it, so she did not try to wrest it from him or refuse his aid.
On the short walk to their campsite, they informed her of their troupe, their parents newly helping to manage a small theatre in Avignon, to which they were en route, giving performances outside each city or small township where they stopped, to help pad their purses for the journey. Their sister played the lead in the dramatic works presented, Jareth often playing opposite as the lead male role.
"You must stay and watch our performance tonight," he urged.
"I don't know…" Christine hedged.
"That is, if you have nowhere else you need to be."
"Where are you headed?" Giles asked.
"Wherever the road takes me I suppose."
"But then, you must stay - at least to watch, this once."
"Say you will, mademoiselle," Jareth encouraged.
"At least give our melodrama a chance - you'll hurt our feelings if you refuse," Giles put in.
Between the brothers Christine felt bombarded, though in a pleasant way, and she smiled.
"Well, perhaps… but you must call me Christine. Christine Lind," she added, giving her grandmother's maiden name, recalling her resolve to conceal her identity this time.
"Lind?" Jareth asked. "You wouldn't be related to Jenny Lind?"
At mention of the Swedish opera singer, Christine fidgeted, not thinking these boys would have heard of her. She could lie, but saw no true problem with being honest, what she preferred.
"Very distantly. A second or third cousin, I think."
She recalled little of what Papa told her of her mother's side of the family, having been a small girl then, though she did remember a few of the details. Christine's dreams of also someday taking center stage had developed and strengthened after hearing of the success of her famous relation...
Once upon another time.
"Do you sing as well?" Jareth asked, as if reading her mind.
"No."
Her answer came so abrupt, so final, she could tell it took the brothers aback.
"Sorry. No, I don't," she said more softly.
"Fair enough," Giles said.
As if sensing her discomfort to talk about herself, they began to regale her with the nature of their troupe and those who were part of it - those who took the stage and those behind the scenes. With their number relatively small, they worked together as a family. Christine learned that everyone lent a hand with helping to run things, even the owners, and she worried they might think her appearance there intrusive. Once she and the boys reached the inside circle of wagons, those in the campsite did look curiously toward her, but without animosity or suspicion, and she felt reassured.
Giles and Jareth's parents politely nodded as Jareth made introductions, the shorter, balding man somewhat reminding Christine of her own papa, with his twinkling brown eyes, the unsmiling woman with her brown hair in a simple bun more reserved. Her no-nonsense manner reminded Christine of her former ballet instructor. Madame Fontaine regarded Christine warily but not unkindly and seemed all down to business while her husband seemed more amiable and easygoing. She took the string of fish Giles handed her and left without a word to anyone.
A fish stew was prepared, and Christine sank to a wooden crate the lads directed her toward, sitting herself sideways near another crate - this one longer and higher and acting as a table. While they waited, the lads began to explain the melodramas and how they were presented. Not unlike the operas were performed, though without vocals sung.
Giles noticed her attention had strayed to a wagon, different from the other closed wagons, this one covered with black cloth midway past its wheels and sitting off to the side at the front end of the stage. Where it would normally be hitched to horses, stairs led up to enter through the curtain and into the long cart.
"That is where Old Hans sits and plays his piano, to accompany what words we speak in the plays. He looks through a crack in the cloth, so he can follow along with the production."
Christine's eyes went wide in amazement. "A piano - here?" Far and wide, nothing but fields of flowers and trees could be seen. "But why cover the wagon like that?"
"The cloth remains night and day, to keep the sun and rain from warping the wood of the instrument," Jareth explained. "Old Hans also has no wish to be seen, he's a rather solitary fellow, and my parents have no wish for him to draw attention away from the melodrama - to have the audience look at him instead of the players onstage. It might seem an odd arrangement, but it works." He shrugged.
His words made Christine feel peculiar, almost dizzy, recalling another musician who hid from the masses with no wish to be seen. She had never learned his name during their long association, an oversight she wished a thousand times she could rectify...
She tried to frame words, noting the boys were looking at her a little strangely.
"Are you alright, Christine?"
"I think… I just need to eat."
"Giles, check to see if the stew is ready."
"Why can't you-"
"Just do it."
The younger boy left, none too happy. Christine struggled to maintain some sort of outer discipline, though her insides quivered with a fearful sort of anticipation.
"Tell me, this man, Hans - what does he look like?"
If he thought her question strange, he did not mention it.
"The man is ancient - must be seventy if he's a day. It's why we call him Old Hans. He has long, white straggled hair, and is a bit stooped in the shoulders. Shorter than me… why? Do you think you might know him?"
Christine gave a lengthy exhale with an odd mix of relief, upon whose fringes lurked disappointment.
"No, I have never met such a man."
She had walked on and on, what seemed endlessly, until almost without realizing it her feet had taken her out of Marseille. A kindly farmer had given her a lift and taken her a good distance in his wagon, until he arrived at his destination, and again Christine walked along the empty road until she could walk no more. With the sky announcing that twilight would soon descend, she'd found a grassy spot beneath some trees a short distance off the road and slept the night there... here.
She had been foolish even to briefly consider the absurd idea. Chances were next to nil that she would run across the path of her Angel again, out in these wilds, in this small slice of France so far from Paris and under such unusual circumstances.
She looked again to where the piano remained hidden.
Strange though, to have such a grand instrument in the middle of nowhere. Yet no more strange, she supposed, than to keep a pipe organ - and play it - five levels beneath the earth...
Thespians ...composers ...musicians - all entertainers were a peculiar lot, and she could be counted in that number. Her own daily routine, and what to her was considered normal these past weeks, many would consider odd.
According to the lads, the area that fronted a makeshift stage of wide planks laid over multiple crates, including those they now used, would be filled that evening, with men and women living within the vicinity who had seen the flyers posted and, for two francs admission, would come in curiosity to see the show. The circle of wagons blocked the stage from those who might try to view it free of charge, and it was at the juncture of two of these that a man would stand and admit those who had money to watch.
The flavorful Bouillabaisse filled the gnawing ache in Christine's belly. When asked if she wanted a second portion of the rich fish stew, she did not refuse. She thanked them for their kindness, uncertain she should remain, though they had done their utmost to wheedle her presence that evening. Yet she could ill afford even two francs admission, having not known a fortnight ago the situation in which she would find herself - once again without a home, without earnings, and without her benevolent violin teacher to help her - and half wished she'd not sent the letter to Madame Giry, with the message for her Angel.
Jareth smiled. "And now, mademoiselle, we would ask a favor in return."
Christine waited a bit nervously for what more he would say.
"We would like you to play for us."
Her first impulse was to quietly refuse - but if not to be heard, why then had she taken lessons?
Monsieur de Ranier had been impressed with how quickly she learned all that he taught her, adding that he was not surprised - and she had wondered why he would think that, barely having known her, but never asked. She wished now that she would have asked him so many things! Him and her Angel both...
The lessons with the Monsieur had stretched over the hours, with a meal shared beforehand or in between, but had been too few in number, lasting only a matter of weeks. Sadly she recalled those occasions with him in his attic apartment. Missing those golden days… missing him. Almost as much as she missed her Angel.
She looked down at her lap to hide the tears.
"I'm not very skilled on the violin. I have only just begun to learn."
"That's alright. We'll know not to expect much. What songs do you know?"
She looked up. "You still want to hear me play?"
"We both would," Giles cut in.
She nodded softly in thought, then lifted the case to the long crate and unlatched it, withdrawing Papa's cherished violin. It gleamed with a vibrant, reddish-brown hue in the morning sun, its pristine condition due to the kindness of her teacher, and before testing the strings, she caressed the polished wood. This time, her papa's face did not come to mind, but another face, one more somber, with eyes hidden by blue pince-nez and a skill with the instrument that was unsurpassed.
Christine sighed and blinked away the tears that had risen, bringing the violin beneath her chin and lifting bow to strings...
He had taught her three songs and partial bits of others, ones not yet fully learned. As she thought of her poor, dear Maestro, the music that came forth was the song that drew her to him on that cold night, when she first heard his glorious music from outside her window.
As she played, she recalled those days and looked back on all those times, her thoughts of Monsieur de Ranier blending into thoughts of the past and her dear Angel…
Two men she had loved. Two men she had lost.
One, who though they had been close - ending in the most passionate embrace she had ever realized - now chose to put distance between them.
One, who though he had forced distance - had drawn close in the beginnings of a relationship coveted - too soon to be seized from this world and from her.
Her Angel left, a wanted man, hoping to find the semblance of peace in a life elsewhere.
Her Maestro died, saving her, saving a child, a fallen hero whom she prayed had found peace.
Somehow, if it were possible, Christine hoped to achieve her own corner of tranquility.
Her song at an end, Christine lowered the bow and opened her eyes, her vision somewhat blurred from fresh tears that glossed over them. Her impromptu performance had not been without flaws, though thankfully few in number and easily masked as she had moved on to the next gliding note.
The boys said nothing, only stared. They exchanged a look, and Giles nodded, Jareth then turning back to her.
"You said you are without skill," he began. "I am happy to inform you that you are mistaken. Happy indeed. Your being here today is a stroke of luck."
Christine shook her head and brushed away the moisture from her lashes. "I don't… understand?" she phrased the reply as a question.
"We told you of Old Hans. He told my father recently that he wants time away to spend with his family and a sister who's ill. My father didn't tell me of course - he doesn't share his business with us - but we found out about it anyhow. We need someone to take Hans's place, only for a short time, until we meet up with him again. He's traveling ahead, by train."
"Oh but - I couldn't perform," Christine hastened to say.
"It wouldn't be much," Giles broke in. "Just bits of music before, as an intro, and then between acts, and a finish at the end. Something to match the mood."
"The song you played could work. Our parents would have to approve, of course," Jareth said. "Do you know any other songs?"
"I… a few. But -"
"Would you be willing to audition for our father?"
Christine blinked.
"I'm not that skilled, to play for an actual production." Monsieur de Ranier's face rose to mind, and she sensed he would disapprove of her hesitation. It wasn't the opera, after all, just a simple performance in the countryside. Literally. "I could practice, I suppose."
It had been her intent to do so all along, wishing only to excel in this new phase of her changed life. Though she still did not consider herself ready to entertain an audience...
Jareth leaned in closer, his expression serious and persuasive, as if he sensed her imminent surrender.
"At least stay and watch the performance tonight. Free of charge. Get an idea of how we do things, and make your decision then."
Christine shook her head a little in disbelief. "Won't your father have something to say about that?"
Jareth's smile came wide. "Trust me, mademoiselle. He will be well pleased."
.
xXx
.
The bandage could at least be managed, the mask a thing of history. For now.
With the herbal paste he had concocted and applied thrice daily, Erik could at least stand the white linen loosely wrapped around his face, so that only the uninjured half was exposed, and allowed what he could as a hole for his eye on the bandaged side, so as to have better visibility.
He closed his mind to the fact that days had passed, almost an entire week, did not dare dwell on all that could have happened in that time, and shrugged into his frock coat afterward reaching for his cloak. He grimaced in surprise at the dual approach of footsteps, as well as the foreign cadence of words from a familiar source.
Slipping his cloak around him and fastening the single clasp, his hands encased in gloves and still slightly stiff from the burns, he turned toward the open door and waited to face the two fools he once trusted as his aides.
First through the doorway came the Persian - stopping in surprise to see Erik on his feet and dressed to go outdoors. No doubt having expected him within the confines of his bed...
Once this man had saved the terror known as 'The Masked Death' from a fate similar to those he had been ordered to construct, with a death just as horrible, by helping him escape Persia. More recently he had given Erik sanctuary, hiding him away from those intent to destroy him after the former Phantom had set out on a violent, albeit foolish course of destruction.
Next through the door came his former aide of the Opera - wary to see him, instantly averting her eyes in her nervousness...
She had helped him as a child, hiding him away from danger - again, due to murder, one he had instigated in self defense. And she had given her aid through the years, in his continual struggle with the management, when he had turned to her for assistance.
He shook his head and glared at both of them. One would think, after their experience with his darker nature, that they would not dare cross him by conspiring to take from him the one person he desired in this entire miserable world.
"You have more courage than I would have given you credit for, Daroga," Erik began softly, his tone a deception to the anger that boiled beneath his every word. "To face me after what you have done. Or perhaps it is foolishness that brings you here, to presume I would be merciful."
The Persian glanced at Madame Giry. "You told him?"
She looked at him and then away without answering.
"Told me?" Erik laughed without humor. "No, I had to drag out that little nugget of information for myself. She had a matter of 'great import' to share - in a letter Christine sent bearing the francs she could ill afford as repayment I did not want!"
His words still came quiet, but with an edge of steel that grew sharper the longer he spoke, the memory of seeing the twenty francs in paper notes and her girlish handwriting to please extend the money and her apology to her Angel again tugging at his heart.
"Unbeknownst to her, another letter was stuck to the wax seal at the back - your letter."
At the accusatory words, the Daroga glanced at Madame Giry who shrugged in apology.
"Did I not instruct," Erik went on in his phantomesque tone, "that neither of you were to interfere? You had no right - You -" His eyes flashed at her. "For leaving the letter out where Christine could read it and draw erroneous conclusions as to my feelings on the matter. Oh, I know that's exactly what you did." His lips twisted in a false, acerbic smile as he nodded slightly. "I well remember my first notes to the old managers and your fear to confront them, leaving them on their desk where they would find them instead of reading them aloud as I told you to do."
When first confronted, Madame admitted to him days ago that she believed, yes, Christine had read the letter. When he pushed her for details, she had told him that she received it the day before Christine left, leaving it lying on the desk.
"And you!" Erik turned his burning eyes on the Daroga. "For writing the damnable letter in the first place!"
"I only meant to protect you -" he began in a quiet, placating tone.
Erik's hand shot up for silence, his patience on the edge of snapping completely.
"I need no protection from Christine. I had handled the matter sufficiently…" His furious gaze swung back to Madame. "You had no need to twist the knife in her tender heart - either of you." He looked back at the Daroga. "And what of Christine - how does your fool idea to keep us apart protect her? It doesn't," he answered himself.
"Oh, I know she is a young woman who has come of age, with a mind of her own. You need not tell me that," - this to Madame Giry who had posed the argument earlier in the week. "Yet she does not have the ability to survive by herself outside the world of the theatre - which is all she's ever known, all that she remembers. Had I not been there to help her, she wouldn't have bothered with a decent meal each day and likely would have been sleeping on the street, amongst derelicts and other unsavory characters! No doubt, is there even now or in even worse straits..."
At the horrible reminder of what she might be facing, Erik grabbed his hat, cursing the sudden wave of dizziness that came over him with the abrupt motion. He put his hand to the desk to steady himself, his strength still slow to return. The pain still vivid and throbbing at times. Yet he could no longer wait.
"You call me a monster for my former actions. Yet what you have done to Christine is unacceptable by all those standards you deem just - more than that, it is reprehensible. If anything should happen to her, if she should come to harm - it will be on your heads. And trust me, if you thought the Phantom of the Opera a frightful adversary, you have seen nothing of which I am capable!"
The two bumbling idiots had the grace to look ashamed, but he did not seek apologies. He required a course of action.
"I made my peace with Christine that night in Paris, and am well aware of the blame that is my own, with how I have erred against her. My intent was - and still is - to rectify past mistakes, to aid her from afar until she can master those necessities she must learn to live independently. It never was my aim to send her running away into the night, thinking herself to blame and a pariah unwanted!" He paused and took a deep breath, feeling his fury once more begin to boil with his words despite his struggle to remain calm. "You are both responsible for causing that unfortunate result and must now do as I instruct, to ensure Christine's safety."
"What is it you would have us do?" the Daroga asked quietly at the same time Madame gave a slight nod of agreement.
Erik addressed her first. "Go home, tend to your essential little trivialities," he barely sneered the word, nothing more important in this world than Christine's life. "But the moment you hear from her, take the next train to inform me and bring her letter with you. This time, do not delay." He hesitated. "If she should return to you - though with the manner in which you have mismanaged the situation I am in doubt she ever would - inform me with all haste, by telegram. Do not leave her side. Neither tell her of my involvement in this. Any of it."
"Oui, monsieur." Tears sparkled in her eyes, her expression somber. "You must understand, I never intended Christine to read that letter. She is like a daughter to me. I would never do anything to cause her pain or to feel unwanted. It was my mistake alone, leaving it out by accident…"
Erik looked at the Daroga. "It was a letter that never should have been written."
The Persian dropped his gaze to the floor.
Erik again addressed her, this time more softly. "Go, Madame. You mentioned you have a train to catch."
"Yes, I…" she hesitated. "I wish you the best in your endeavor to find her, Maestro. I will keep you and Christine both in my prayers."
With a bare glance toward the Daroga, she hurried out the door, presumably to finish packing.
"And you…"
"I have heard all you have said and admit that I am in error," his fool acquaintance stated before Erik could further upbraid him. "Only tell me what I can do to help."
If Erik was in top form, he might further make the Daroga's life - specifically this hour - a misery. Might shove him up against a wall, put him in a stranglehold, threaten all manner of suffering for his unwelcome interference. Yet what both men knew and he would never admit was that for Erik to stoop to such base methods of devilry he would have to be pushed far indeed. They had endured much together, in Persia, and Erik meant it when he told Christine that he was weary of all the violence and only wanted to find peace.
And yet should any harm come to her, he was certain that would be the factor to push him to that deadly brink, no matter what former acquaintance he and the Daroga shared.
"Tell me why I should trust you. Why I should ever trust you again…"
Having stood on his feet too long, the former Phantom began to feel woozy and planted his gloved fingers to the desk, once more cursing the doctor for his bloodthirsty methods of leeching while Erik had been unaware. Though that was not the sole contributing factor to his current distress; certainly the debridement of dead skin with the maggots had helped to further the cause. That excruciating therapy, though it gave him disgust, he could at least understand.
"A fair question," the Daroga said and nodded. "When I wrote the letter to Madame Giry, I never expected that Miss Daaé would respond in such a manner and put herself in possible danger." He brought his hands out to his sides, palms upward. "I did not think she would read the letter. It has led to an unfortunate series of events I never anticipated, and for that, Erik, you have my most sincere apology."
He could refuse to have anything more to do with the man, but Christine's well being was more important than his justifiable anger.
"I need your detecting skills, Daroga. For you to take the east side of the city, while I take the west. However," a note of suspicion came into his voice, "Can I trust that should you find her you will not send her running in the opposite direction?"
"You have my word. If I should find her, I will bring her to you."
"No."
The Persian looked taken aback by Erik's abrupt response and lifted his dark brows to his red astrakhan hat.
"No?"
"Should you find her, you are to take her to Paris, to Madame Giry. If she is suspicious, tell her you are a friend of Madame's who sent you to find her and bring her home. Only then are you to inform me."
Feeling the need to sit a moment, Erik lowered himself to a nearby chair.
"Are you well, my friend?"
"You need not wait on me. Go."
"I believe it would be more practical for us to search together."
Erik frowned at the Persian's immediate choice to argue the point. "We can cover more ground apart."
"It might have escaped your notice, but I never met the young mademoiselle. You never brought her to visit, despite my many persuasions. I know little of what she looks like, having only seen her from afar and briefly. Your descriptive phrases of her angelic qualities and especially her voice are all that I have to go on. However, I cannot very well ask every young woman I run across to sing for me."
At the fiery look of warning Erik shot him, Erik finding no humor in the matter, the Daroga cleared his throat and sobered. "Ah yes, well, you can see why searching together would work best. I can be your mouthpiece, should you prefer not to interact with others."
He had no wish to admit it, but the Daroga made sense. People stared with the mask, their interest based on fear and suspicion. With his face bandaged, interest would invoke pity - neither of which he wanted.
"Come along then if you must," he grumbled and struggled to rise, leading the way out of his bedchamber.
x
Unable to sit his horse as yet, Erik procured the driver's services a second time, the first when he ordered him to retrieve Cesar from the stables near the boarding house. Thankfully, the driver, formerly in service to Erik's grandfather, did not stare or intrude where he was unwanted and hurried to ready the family carriage. Finally, a servant who could be considered worthy - fading into the background until needed, promptly acting on orders as instructed.
Yet if Erik had hoped to blend into the crowd - the very appearance of a foreigner in a peculiar hat walking beside a man who towered above most, with half his face wrapped in strips of white linen - brought more than an occasional stare, and many did a double-take. Erik tamped down the dread of being recognized as the Phantom, aware they made an unusual pair, any curiosity due to that, and struggled to ignore the blatant rudeness typical of those whom he encountered.
Upon alighting from the carriage, in taking the step down, a wave of dizziness swept over him. He groped the edge of the carriage to prevent a fall to the cobbles, once again cursing his weakness, the doctor who caused it, and the entire medical profession who thought leeching a worthy method of recovery.
The Daroga's hand clutched his arm to give aid. Erik abruptly shook it off.
"I am not an invalid," he groused. "Kindly desist from treating me as one."
"No, of course not. However, you might wish to rest in the shade on that bench ahead while I inquire within the shops. Since it sits in the shadows, as you tend to prefer."
"Daroga, do not push me to the point of forgetting why I should not push you beneath the wheels of the next oncoming carriage."
"Why, my detecting skills, of course. Twenty years in service as the chief of police to the most supreme power of Persia does tend to make my prowess of stellar quality." He gave an affable smile. "If you did not believe it so, I would not be here. No?"
Erik grumbled something thoroughly uncomplimentary and unfit for the ears of the two elderly women who approached the door of the nearest shop, arm in arm. They gave both men a curious, shocked glance, the majority of it focused on Erik.
He lowered his hat over his eyes and ignored them, as he ignored all else. Normally, he enjoyed a good banter with his well-learned acquaintance (after this latest betrayal, he could hardly think of him as a friend), aware that Kahn also derived some form of pleasure from their unusual method of discourse. Yet presently his fear for Christine prevented him from experiencing anything but worry for the girl - the constant reminder that too much time had passed for her not to have found trouble besieged his every waking thought…
Erik sincerely hoped that she had learned enough these past months to at least take meals substantial and not ones solely composed of sugar, such as a child would choose. He dared not think of where she had slept…
He recalled those days he had been her angel and guardian, her protector, acting to her as a father, at times her teacher, later expressing his wish to be her lover and husband. It was no wonder the girl had shown confusion during those last months shared in Paris, in what he deemed a necessary masquerade. Even in her illness at the boarding house she had reached out for her Angel, and he hoped he had not damaged her irreparably.
Noting the Daroga awaited his response, Erik addressed him.
"Go inside and make your inquiries. I will sit and watch the street for anyone familiar who might visit the ruins of the boarding house or be lingering nearby." Never would he admit to the Daroga that he had correctly deduced Erik's need for rest, the carriage ride seeking out every bump and lurch in the road.
He blatantly ignored the galling Persian's condescending smile as he nodded, aware the man could see through his excuse.
Damn him. If not for his meddlesome ways, there would be no need for this hunt to begin with…
And if not for Erik's vengeance to take down an entire theatre - thus destroying everything he had worked so hard to create - Christine would never have come to Marseille. Added to that his cruel and distant words when last they spoke: he was just as responsible for driving her from Paris.
As the former Phantom of the Opera took a seat on the middle of the bench against a shop wall, not leaving enough room on either side for unwanted company, he bit off his own bitter slice of the blame.
The sun directly overhead brought his surroundings into sharp view, while he sat somewhat concealed in the shade. He stared past the people who walked along the sidewalks nearby and across the road, his attention going to the hull of the blackened boarding house - he, for once, not the culprit of a fire…
... startled when the true little instigator drifted into view, like a black-clad ghost.
When he made his excuse to the Daroga, he had not truly thought it would bear fruit.
The girl stopped and looked up at the building, her back to him, then slowly turned, her eyes looking toward his direction and suddenly catching his.
Instantly Erik pulled the wide brim of his black fedora low and looked down at the ground by his boots, scowling when the scuffed tops of her little flat-soled, laced black shoes came into view.
"Monsieur?" the child queried.
He ignored her, in the hope she would go away.
"Are you alright?" she asked after a long moment when he made no move to acknowledge her.
Looking down this long did not help his need to achieve clear thought or balance, and he lifted his head to give a curt nod, hoping that she would now be satisfied.
She did not go away but instead stared at the bandage covering half his face, at his hair - no longer long, curly and reddish brown but dark and hitting at his nape. At his clothes - no longer flagrant and bold but a subdued black. Then she turned her attention to his eyes again not meeting hers and squinted as if trying to imagine the blue pince-nez there…
"Does it hurt?" she asked, looking back at the bandage. "Were you there that night too?"
At last he narrowed his gaze on her sad little face. Her eyes appeared haunted, the burden she bore too weighty for her tiny shoulders, her manner forlorn.
Yes, she had been responsible for all of what happened, in part for his injuries and Christine's disappearance as well. Yet her crime of carelessness could not compare to his reign of terror in Paris. Hers had been the result of an unfortunate accident that bore no malicious intent. His had been deliberate - the result of three months of plotting with bitter revenge as its source. He could not judge her guilty when the blame he carried deserved a much harsher punishment.
Erik had never disliked the girl; of all the strangers at the boarding house he had regarded the child with more than simple tolerance, remembering her kindness to leave him with a plate of biscuits even though he had snapped at her that day and night in his fear over Christine's illness.
He exhaled a weighty breath.
"Hello, Jess."
At the sound of his low, deep voice, her eyes grew too big for her small, pinched face. Her mouth parted wide in shock.
"Monsieur de Ranier?" she whispered, looking again at his subdued clothing and dark hair, as if trying to find the similarity to the tenant her mother once housed in their attic.
He gave another short nod - confused when her eyes suddenly glossed over, heavy with moisture.
"You didn't die?" she exclaimed, the tears rising thick in her voice. "I didn't kill you?!"
Before he could respond to such a startling pronouncement, she threw herself against him, winding her little arms around his neck and began to cry in earnest against his shoulder.
Erik froze in alarm, aware that several passersby had turned to stare, giving them attention he did not want and could ill afford…
Yet something in his heart softened to hear her muffled, pitiful sobs, and instead of pushing her away, he lifted an awkward hand to pat her on the back.
"There, now," he said gruffly as a comfort, having only ever offered consolation to Christine and out of his depth in dealing with others, once having considered them all unworthy. Though if they had treated him with some form of compassion, he might have done the same.
"Come..." Gently he pulled her arms from around his neck and pushed her from him. "You must stop crying, Jess." He injected a tone of command in his low words.
She nodded softly, uncertainly, and swiped repeatedly at her wet eyes and cheeks.
He had no handkerchief to dry her tears and almost groaned aloud when a dark-skinned hand moved into view bearing a red silk cloth. Gritting his teeth he took it, having no need to look at the bearer to ascertain identity. He wiped the girl's cheeks dry and had her blow her nose before handing the cloth back, all the while keeping his eyes on the child.
"Now then," he addressed her, his voice remaining low, "what happened was an accident. Do not convince yourself into believing otherwise. We all have regrets for actions we have committed that have led to another's distress. You will speak of this no more - to anyone. Do you understand?"
She solemnly nodded.
"Good. Now, I must ask you, the young woman who also lived in the tenement - Mademoiselle Daaé - have you seen her since that night?"
Again she nodded, much to Erik's surprise. He had felt the need to question but had not expected that answer.
"When did you last see her?"
"Saturday...?"
"You do not sound sure."
The girl thought a moment then gave an emphatic nod. "It was Saturday."
Four days ago.
"And did you speak with her?"
Again Jess nodded, and Erik struggled not to snap at her in his impatience.
"Where was this? What did you discuss?"
She pointed to the street in front of the boarding house.
"I told her that it was all my fault, and…" She worriedly sucked in her bottom lip as if she knew he would not like what she would say. "I told her you were dead. That your blue spectacles were found all twisted and the gendarmes and Maman said you were dead. I'm sorry, monsieur…"
He briefly let his eyes fall shut and took a stabilizing breath.
"Did she say anything to that?"
The child shook her head. "She walked away. I called after her, but she didn't come back."
Erik failed to know why he should expect anything more. As Monsieur de Ranier he had taken on the role as her teacher in violin, just as he had once been her teacher in voice. At the most she had begun to look at him as a friend. Still, Christine's apparent disinterest stung.
He pushed past his injured feelings and asked, "What direction did she go?"
Again she pointed - this time to the street that held the cafe Christine had frequented.
He nodded once, satisfied. "You must go now - and remember what I told you."
"Oui, monsieur." She gave him another smile. "I am happy to see you did not die and hope your face feels better soon."
As the girl walked away toward one of the shops, a new little bounce in her step, Erik finally, grudgingly, looked at his acquaintance in the hunt.
The Daroga was smiling from ear to ear, his dark face an expression of happy surprise, delight shimmering in his jade green eyes.
Erik lifted a hand to silence him before he could speak.
"Not a word, Daroga. Not one bloody word."
"I wouldn't dream of it," he said, the smile having leaked into his voice.
Growling under his breath, Erik stood as fast as he was able and snapped his cloak, making his way back to the carriage, with the Persian in tow.
All that mattered was to find Christine if he had to cover every inch of this city to do it, though at least he now had a clue where to begin the hunt.
xXx
A/N: Ah, Erik, you're such a softie at heart. ;-) Thanks for the reviews!