The clergyman was young and romantic, so that the idea of a “masked marriage” was not calculated to raise his suspicions—rather, it interested him greatly.  They seemed a handsome pair, the lady all in white after the style of the English queen, her face hidden by a silvery loo-mask, and the gentleman concealed behind a mask of white.  The reason for disguise, the man had told the clergyman was that the young lady's guardian did not approve of her marriage, though she was of age, and would attempt to stop if he might.

Dutifully, the man of the church inquired of the lady whether she came willingly, whether she fully desired the position which she was to take upon herself.  She replied in the affirmative, and the idealistic young fellow laid the tightness in her voice to nervous excitement, not to the dread and reluctance to which it belonged.

No objection being laid, he began the ceremony, little knowing the unhappiness into which he was binding the lovely girl.  Christine nearly recoiled when ordered to place her hand in that of the masked man, and could barely force “I shall” from her constricted throat.  And then, death knell to her faintest of hopes—she knew not what hopes—the part was reached were vows are made, and she heard the loathed voice saying “I take thee, Christine...” … and then she too must repeat the lines.

“I take thee, Erik....”  She vaguely remembered that it was the name the clergyman had used in the previous question, and instinctively she spoke it back, as thoughtlessly as a parrot.

At last!  Her quotation was finished; the broad, heavy ring was replaced on her narrow finger; and the man was bade kiss his wife.  She shuddered as he—Erik—placed his hands on her arms—and kissed her upon her pallid mouth, though she thought her eyes must have pleaded as plainly as ever words could plead for her mercy.  Oh, but she knew what his response would have been to that: I have never known mercy; why should I show it unto you?

As they returned back up the aisle, she felt a tear slide from her eye beneath the loo-mask as she realised that she might spend another ten—twenty—thirty years with this man, who must be sixty years of age.  Sixty!

The thought brought her attention back to reality, which almost seemed however to be a mere exhibit behind glass.  He was now leading her to a closed carriage, which would convey them to the house which he had ordered her to lease before they went to the church.  The carriage door was open; she climbed inside and placed her attention upon the street scene outside her window, so that when the man—Erik—entered, she need not notice him, nor he notice the moisture which had begun to drip from her chin.

Her thoughts drifted back to their earlier occupation: Sixty!  So many years... she would be old and grey before she was free—old and grey, wrinkled and careworn....  And when he was elderly and failing, she must out of duty tend solicitously to her husband—her husband!  Terrible words—her husband.  In despair, she leaned her face upon her hand, which rested on the ledge of the window and, able to contain herself no longer, began audibly to weep.  Oh, the misery of it!  Her beauty and good health wasted, her mind and voice restrained—her heart forever with “to let” upon its door, until the organ had decayed to the point of collapse.

Cut through her grief, “Why do you weep, Christine?”  She expected here to feel herself being manhandled, but did not; the man must have thought better of doing so.

“Why should I not be wretched?” she inquired wetly, by way of reply.  “My youth has been stolen, my heart torn from me and buried in funeral—my hope of happiness is gone, and I am m-married—and don't even know my own name!”

“Devereux,” said her companion.

“Could I care!”  (Such the famed woman's nature, which expresses itself by means of a problem, which problem is yet only a veneer over the true grievance, rendering the answer to the stated problem only an irritation.)  “Do you believe that you can reconcile me to this fate? and by what means?  Oh, you are a fool!  Nevertheless I shall serve you, as I promised I should, as far the tasks which you demand—but you shall demand nothing more of me than that—nothing.”

He apparently had no reply which he felt suitable, or perhaps merely did not care to reply.  Thus, the journey was finished in silence, but for Christine's quiet sobbing.

They reached the apartment at length and were soon inside, the girl looking like a wilted white iris, the man rather like a rod of wrought iron.  For several moments they stood together in the foyer, facing one another.

“Remove the mask.”

Mutely, she did.  M Devereux, satisfied, turned and ascended the stair leading up to the second floor, while behind him his wife collapsed to her knees on the dusty parquet of the drape-darkened entry to weep once more.  Why—why had she done it?  Had there truly been no alternative, if she would have Raoul free?  No point in considering that now; she could only carry on in the track she had begun for herself.  No escape....  She rose weakly, slowly passed through the open doors of the room to her right, to find a dark, dingy drawing room, rather a wreck.  The furniture was old, its upholstery fraying, and the filthy carpets appeared to have suffered from the appetites of a dynasty of moths, while the drapes appeared to have exerted a magnetic force of attraction upon every particle of dust which had passed within three feet of them.  When she cautiously opened these marvelous creators of sneezes, the windows were little better, being spotted with dirt that had clung to rain blown against the glass.

After a minute of despair at the grime, Madame Devereux set grimly to work, for she had learned that work serves as a fair distraction from woe.  Only short while later, she stopped, realising that she still wore the Victoria gown—most inadequate garb for her work.  She had two boxes from her old residence; from one she pulled an old dress that she found suitable to its new purpose.

Attired in this, she returned to her industry, driving her hands and feet to move quickly, never permitting herself to fall into the slow rhythm that is such a cordial invitation to melancholy.  For melancholy would neither clean the room, nor wring mercy from her master.  Five hours she worked on, until a clock—evidently wound, as a kindness by the owner to his new tenants—the clock chimed seven, pulling her from her dull, trance-like state of mind into the awareness that she was famished, indeed she was nearly faint and could work no longer.

There were bread and cheese in one of her boxes, she remembered, taken from her room in the old boarding house, and she and M. Devereux might make a sufficient-enough repast on that, with enough left for breakfast in the morning, after which she could seek further supplies in the shops, or a market.  Already she was becoming a forward-planning housekeeper, she thought with a rueful grimace, when she had been a popular singer only—only the evening before.  Oh, the misery of it! and her tired limbs agreed with all their remaining might.

The humble dinner prepared, Christine carried some of it upstairs on a clean handkerchief, knocking at a door ajar which proved to be Devereux's.  At his permission, she entered the dimly lit room and espied him sitting before a low fire, book in hand, his gaze seeming to be toward nothing in particular.

“Monsieur,” ventured the wife, “your supper—” and she set it on a desk that stood near the door.  Supposing it her duty, she continued in a flat tone, “I have cleaned the drawing room, but it shall require new furnishing to be at all respectable, if that is what you desire.  Before I go, will you tell me which room is to be my own?”

He replied; she said her good-night and went to investigate her assigned room—a small one, although with a second, larger room attached to it, such that one might serve as bedchamber, the other boudoir.  They were not as filthy as the drawing room had been, due to the holland covers over the furniture, but still they were dark and gloomful, bringing to the room an oppression so thick that one could nearly feel it dragging against her limbs as she moved.  Tomorrow—tomorrow, Christine would go out to purchase food, as well as some pleasanter furnishings for herself: a chair, perhaps, and a table; a painting in pale colors, and some light fabrics for curtains and trimmings.  These, she would pay for with the money she had saved out of her wages at the theatre, and so the rooms might at least be rendered endurable, if the situation could not.

Oh, Raoul!  If only it had been he to whom she had been this afternoon married!  Then—no dirty apartment, but a steamer to Italy, or some other such wonderful place; no bread-and-cheese supper, but something prepared by one of the finest chefs in Europe, doubtless.  The day would not have have been spent in separation from him, but in glorious hours in each other's company.  She would not have retreated from his kiss, but returned it gladly—for she loved him!

At the memory of Erik Devereux's kiss, she hurried downstairs again, there to scrub her lips vigorously with soap—yet nothing could cleanse away the memory of it!  She shuddered again.

Christine's day ended by nine o' clock that night, once she had pulled the holland cover from the bed, hauled her boxes up to her room, put herself into her nightgown, and surrendered herself to her bed, with its musty sheets and thin pillows, to cry herself to sleep.

In the morning, the sun shone in her windows, illuminating the rips in the drapes, and Madame Devereux sat up with a creak in her bed, wondering where she was before she remembered—that it was not all a horrid nightmare, but truth.  She was in the room which she would from now on call her own; somewhere in the apartment was the man known as the Phantom—her husband.  She twisted the heavy ring on her finger, wishing she could pull it off, hurl it out the window, and thereby be at her liberty.  How was she to stand decades in this fashion?

It mattered not, she supposed; she could only rise, go about her work, and watch the days pass.  Today would be the first of many—and the sooner she began it, the sooner it would end, and the sooner she could retreat to her bed for hours of peace and freedom.

She found Devereux again where he had been the night before; upon seeing him, she put his portion of bread and cheese on the desk and told him of her intended errand for food.  Of the other, she said nothing, refusing to allow him to deprive her of the light, airy things which might be her sanity's sole saviour.

[About two and a half years after the last scene.]

And then—came the accident.  It happened, one day, that Christine had ridden in a higher cab than usual, and tripped in her skirts as she descended, which brought her heavily to the group, such that she landed awkwardly upon one ankle and the opposite wrist, which at once pained her greatly.  But though it did, she sent the cab driver away as soon as he had helped her into the apartment, fearing that M. Devereux should encounter him.

When Devereux came out of his study some minutes later, he found Christine seated on the floor at the foot of the stairs, attempting to pull herself up to sit upon the first step.

“Christine!”

He made his descent in only a few seconds, asking curtly as he reached the bottom of the staircase, “What happened?”

“I 'took a tumble' while getting down from a carriage—I am only a little bruised and shaken—shall be quite well presently,” she replied, trying to make light of the accident.  “You needn't att—”

To have finished the last sentence would have been futile, because Devereux had already lifted her up and was carrying her up the stairs to her suite, wherein he laid her on the couch in her boudoir.  She was rather befuddled by this behavior, knew not what to make of it, and decided not to try to make anything of it.  She had just closed her eyes to try to sleep, hoping that the pain would be less when she awoke, when heard Devereux ask, “What did you hurt in your 'tumble'?  Was it your ankle?”

She nodded briefly, refusing tell him of the wrist, and was astonished to find him kneeling down near her foot—taking that foot in his hands to try to ascertain whether any of the bones had been fractured—and those hands were gentle, never gripping too tightly, nor pressing the injured foot too far in one direction or another, always stopping when she flinched.  It was the epitome of peculiarity.

“I think it unlikely that the ankle is broken,” said the Epitome at last.  “There is probably a sprain, however—and so you shall have to rest for a time.”

She looked rather blankly at him.  “I cannot.  If I do, who is to keep the house in order?  Who to shop, to cook, to clean, to mend?  Perhaps I do not do it well, I was never trained for housekeeping, but at least I see it accomplished!”

“Write to an employment office, requesting to hire a daytime maid.  She need never see me—I shall see you only in the evenings.”

“See me?”  She blanched—evenings spent with him invading the privacy of her personal chambers?

“See your foot, I should say, and help you into your bed.”

“No!  No, the maid may do that, and you may examine my foot in the mornings, before she has come.  It shall be a much better system, I am sure!”

Erik looked at her, her dark tousled curls and wide, wary eyes—so childish!—and understood.  She was a child in some ways, for all that she had taken on—for all that he had forced her to take on—numerous of a woman's tasks.

“Certainly,” he replied, and left.

Well! was Christine's thought.  Such amazing behavior—it was the most ordinarily human that he had ever acted... the most... like a husband.  The latter thought gave her a start of fright—but beneath surface reactions was a minute seed of attraction to the idea.  But—no point in thinking of all that.  Where was her book?  Surely she had left it near the couch?  She looked around, at last discovering the book to be on a windowsill on the other side of the room, far out of her reach.  Very well; she must get down on her knees and crawl upon them and her good wrist, and then carry the book back between her teeth, for it was a small volume.  However, about halfway between the couch and the window, she forgot to manage her skirts, became entangled, and lost her balance, falling forward and wrenching her wrist again, which elicited from her a sharp cry.

Within half a minute, she heard footsteps in the hall, and in a few seconds more the boudoir door had been opened to admit Devereux.

“I thought, Madame, that I had ordered rest.”“I kept my foot from the ground—I was... was crawling, and tripped myself in this skirt.”

“Then, why did I hear you cry out?”

“I was startled, and vexed.”

He was cynically silent, only once more lifting her up and depositing her on the couch, where she lay with one wrist oddly bent.

“Have you any spare cloth, no matter whether used or new?”

“In that basket, left over from the curtains.  Oh, must you?  Could not a surgeon—”

“We can neither of us fetch one.”

And Devereux set about binding the wrist, using two pens as splints.  It was done presently, and he realised that his his wife was watching him, narrow-eyed.

“Where did you learn physick?” she asked.

Replied the man, “I have read a great deal over the past fifteen years, and I have always had some ability to translate words into their applications.”  He handed her the book which she had wanted.  “You will call for me if you require—anything.  If not summoned before, I shall return at six o'clock.  Good day, Madame.”

If Madame Devereux had been perplexed before, she was now completely flummoxed.  He—Devereux!  He had heard her, had come at once, had seen to her—would voluntarily return—had asked nothing of her!  Perhaps he had at last realised her daily efforts to keep house, even to keep her spirits alive, and this was repayment.

If only he were Raoul... he would sit here with her, instead of going off to his study... he would talk to her, laugh with her... but, no... Raoul had never been one to laugh with her, indeed he had laughed very little.  Still, he might have read to her, asked if he might send for anything to be brought to her, soothed and comforted her!  (But would he, wondered that secret, rebellious cellar of her mind, would he have overdone the thing?  Would she have felt burdened by his attentions?  Did she—could she prefer Devereux's cool, sensible reactions to Raoul's pampering?  Ah, she had become hardened by these months of work and mental wear.)

Well, never mind the entire problem; she supposed she ought to be pleased that relations between the two of them were perhaps reaching a state of truce.  Life would be more bearable that way, she thought; after all, there were many marriages of convenience made, many former attachments broken off for their sakes, and those ladies resigned themselves to it, as long as their husbands were not  brutes.

Strange, how she herself had become resigned to her fate....  In the first weeks, she had thought that she would forever see the world through a veil of tears, had wanted to do so!  To allow her mood to brighten was to acknowledge compliance, and something in this life which had made her less unhappy—and submission to the Phanto was an error she had once before committed, must never commit again.  But she was young, unable to continue suppression of spirits youthfully elastic; it was inevitable that she should begin again to find interest in life: in arranging her rooms, decorating them to be brighter; in books; in the kitten she had found wandering about in the street in front of the house.

This kitten, a demure, snowy miss by name of Cecile, now came from the hallway—the door to the boudoir must have been left open—and settled herself in her mistress' lap, making a striking image of white against black.

For Christine dressed always in black, responding if interrogated that she wore mourning for her father.  In truth, she wore it for the promise of her past.  Her hair, too, was usually arranged in a sober mode, combed as straight as she could make it and coiled in an unprepossessing, governess-ish style, and the curls noted hitherto were evident only because her fall from the carriage had loosed the pins and mussed strands.  Previously, she had seemed like a widow of five-and-thirty; now, she looked a girl again.

Idly she stroked Cecile, allowing her mind to wander where it would, until it stumbled over something, a thing she had never realised: she had some kind of power over Devereux—had held it for a not-inconsiderable period.  She had said, in name only; he had never since that one time attempted to kiss her.  She had said, I shall not dine with you; he had capitulated.  She had pleaded to keep Cecile; here was the kitten, asleep in her lap.  She had been injured; he tended to her.  She had cried out; he had come at once.  Manifestly, her influence was not inconsiderable; and as it is often pleasing to discover that one has influence, so she was pleased, and wished to try the wield of this new-found power.  Would she, dared she?  Yes! for the sake of curiosity.

“Monsieur!” she called, with an object in mind.

She heard a door elsewhere in the house, and Devereux was presently in her doorway, inquiring if she had wanted something.

“If you will please bring my writing things—they are in the drawer of that cabinet—I shall write for a maid.”

He procured the items for her and went back to his study, shaking his head as he did, for he had been certain that Christine would keep her proud silence and separation; this sudden summons had been unexpected, indeed!

And in her boudoir, Christine half-smiled to herself, feeling that a scrap of her self-respect was regained through this hour's interesting revelation.

As promised, Devereux came again at six, this time with a plate of bread and cold meat and a glass of Madeira.

“You will want dinner, Madame.”

“Thank you,” and she ate.

At nine he came a fourth time, to find an awkwardly-positioned Christine asleep on the couch, still wearing her daytime black dress—and here was a problem.  He roused her with a light shaking of her shoulder, hoping that she would not be alarmed.  She was not, but asked, “What?  Is something the matter?”

“You ought to be in bed; it will be uncomfortable for you to spend the night on that couch—and you ought to wear something other than that.”

“However,” she replied, “being incapacitated I cannot, and so I must wear this.  Woman has endured worse.”

“If you will permit of my assistance—”

“No!  You transgress the limits of propriety, monsieur!  Recall—in name only!”

“Dear lady,” said Devereux sardonically, “your words have been thoroughly impressed upon my mind, and willingly have I heeded them.  I propose only this: to fetch whatever garment you desire, undo whatever clasps—if any—you cannot accomplish for yourself, exit the immediate premises while you enact your change, renter to fasten whatever—if anything—you cannot do for yourself, and finally to serve as your transportation into the next room, at with juncture I shall withdraw, and in the morning turn over this diverting ritual to a capable woman sent by the establishment to which you have recently written.  Is propriety offended still?”

Quietly, “No, monsieur.  You shall find a nightdress in the wardrobe.”

The plan was carried out as it had been outlined, with one exception—that being, that before Devereux served as her means of transportation, she called upon him for another purpose, saying rather shyly, “Monsieur—will you comb my hair?  It will be in a dreadful tangle tomorrow if it is not done, and I cannot manage with only one hand.”

He yielded to the behest.  And then it was done, she was put into her bed, the covers drawn up over her, the gas extinguished.  Christine, halfway down the hill of slumber, thought that perhaps she felt a light touch trailing across her forehead... and knew nothing any longer.  In the unlit room Devereux laid his hand once more upon his wife's brow, and departed.

The maid came; she was a cheery woman, very much on the wrong side of fifty, and inclined to be grandmotherly in attitude.  She had lost her last situation because she had overstepped her place—but Christine, longing for female company and not opposed to having an adviser with the advantage of seniority, felt that these qualities suited Helene Boudrot to her almost to perfection.  Helene was perceptive, too: on the second day of her employment, she said to Christine as the two sat in the latter's boudoir—Helene, busy with mending—

“Madame Devereux, is it impertinent of me to inquire—is there another person living in this house?”

“Why do you ask, Helene?”

“It feels as though it was inhabited by more than yourself—and there is some food missing from the back of the larder, which I am certain was present when I first saw it yesterday.  Are you sheltering a deserter from the army, perchance?”

“No, Helene, I am not.”

“There must be someone, however?”

Christine sighed.  “You were not supposed to discover it.”

“Begging your pardon, but it is difficult to overlook missing stores.”

“We overlooked that aspect of it—I and—M. Devereux.”

Helene paused in her darning of a stocking.  “Your husband, Madame?”

“Yes.”

“Is he, begging your pardon again, a criminal in hiding?”

“Hiding—you might say so; the other—I do not know, although I must hope not.”

“He is dear to you, if you are still here, though so uncertain?”

The younger woman's voice was choked as she countered, “No, Helene.  My hand was forced.  I was to have married another, whom I loved.  Helene, have you heard of what happened at the Opera, two years ago?”

“Of course, Madame.  Ah... I see.  It is the belle and beast, is it?”

“In a way; only, the beast was gentle, and the belle heart-whole.”

“Monsieur is cruel to you, then?” asked Helene, with manifest anxiety.  “Did he—has he beaten you, Madame?”

“It is all... no, he has never beaten me; he was very good to me when I fell from the carriage.  It is only that he forced me away from the one I loved, commanded me to sing—he admires my voice—but he has not done that, in the past few weeks.  There is no sting anymore, no open wound—only an ache, which sometimes throbs, and a bleary apathy.  It—it is not a bad existence, Helene, for I am not wholly isolated from the world, and I have some pleasant things... but it is not a life which any sensible woman would envy, unless she were homeless or starving.  And he is old, Helene... more than sixty, I believe.”

A very vigorous sixty, thought Helene archly, if he carried Madame up the front stairs, and then lifted her twice more, for she had heard these stories from Christine.  However, she did not voice this opinion, for her shrewd mind suspected that the girl was promising herself—“Ten years—perhaps thirty—it cannot be longer!”  She would not announce her opinion, thereby making it a despairing, “Thirty years—perhaps fifty—oh, it will be eternity!”  Perhaps the time would come when those words would be uttered, and in a rapturous tone; that day was not this.

“It is hard, poor girl,” said the woman instead, “and all the harder because there's nothing for it but to carry on, and on.”

“Is that all that life consists of—carrying on, punctuated by a scrap of happiness here and there?”

“One never knows, Madame.”

Several days later, there came a ring at the door, and Helene, upon opening, saw before her a well-dressed young gentleman.  In reply to the maid's “Good morning, monsieur; may I help you?” he said, “Is Mademoiselle Daae in?”

“Mademoiselle Daae?”  Then, she recalled that her mistress had told her that such had been her maiden name.  “Indeed, monsieur; if you will come with me?  Shall I announce you?”

“No, for I wish to surprise her.”

So Helene led him upstairs to Christine's boudoir, showing him in with, “Madame—a caller.”

Christine put down her book as the caller stepped into the room—and then she gasped.

“Raoul!  Come, sit!”

The viscount seated himself on a hassock near to her couch, gazing at her—as if she were a painting of herself—as he said, “My angel!  How long has it been—two years!”

“It—has been a very long time, hasn't it?” said Christine, repeating his words to gain time to compose herself.

“But not so long that you have forgotten me?  Not so long that it is too late, for you are free, I see!  How have you managed to be Mademoiselle Daae yet?”

Here, she drew back.

“I have not, Raoul; you must call me Madame Devereux, now.”

“Madame Devereux?  Then you have married, though you might have come to me and I would not have grudged you?”

“You mistake; my marriage is a consequence of that time in the catacombs.  His name, is Devereux.  I am not free.”

He took both of her hands in comforting supplication.  “But—you do not love him, Christine?”

“Never.”

“And does he care for you?”

“I am well provided for, and he is not harsh with me.”

“A loveless marriage to—to that!  How do you stand it, poor darling?”

“There is little that one cannot tolerate, if one must, and I have no choice.”

“Then—let me come and see you, Christine, and give you something to look forward to—you need it, you know; you'll look twice your age by the time you're thirty!  Let me—”

“Let me go,” she interrupted.  “Perhaps in your eagerness you had not observed—my wrist was recently broken in an accident, and to have it held pains me greatly.”

“Was it him—has he laid violent hands upon you?”  Raoul was at once ready to be in a fury against the other man.

“It was nothing more interesting than a fall from a carriage, the cause of which was my own foot caught, by my own clumsiness, in my own skirt.  You are so concerned... you do still care for me just as you did two years ago, don't you dear, dear Raoul!”

Her eyes, he thought, expressed supplication, a plea for warmth, for affection—for love.  Married?  Nay!  She had taken his name, and that was all; she did not possess his heart; she was not married.  Such was Raoul's justification as he breathed, “My poor angel—my love!” and leaned forward to kiss her.

Christine saw the beginning of the movement, began herself to mirror it—and paused.  How she yearned for Raoul to kiss her, to take away Devereux's one kiss, which had clung as though impressed with a brand!  Yet—as they drew nearer to one another, she realised that Raoul's kiss, though it might cover the brand for as long as it lasted, would not erase it permanently; quite the opposite, for it would cause her lips to burn upon the coals of Shame, and it would stain them with the ugly hue of guilt—for she was a married woman, she had spoken her vows to Devereux, and she must keep them to the best of her ability.  So, with her good hand she repelled Raoul's advance, and suddenly a disgust came over her.

“Why did you?” she asked.  “I am a married woman; I have only just told you so.  Have you no honor, that you could do such a thing?”

He was taken aback, the more so when she moved to the other end of the couch.  “Christine!  You said that neither of you loves the other—never has!  Don't you see—you are hardly married at all!”

“It is a bad philosophy, Raoul, and it is invalid, for the question is not one of love, but of duty.  I knew what I did; I cannot even claim that I was fooled into my choice; I must accept the consequences and honor my words.  If I cannot love my—my husband—I can at least respect my word to him.”

“Will that make you happy?  You know that he does not deserve such respect!”

“More so than bearing for the rest of my life the burden of the knowledge that I broke my promise.  Perhaps that may sound trivial, but there is an uglier term for it: infidelity.  I am not miserable anymore, Raoul, though it may pain you to hear it; to annex the the word infidelity to my being would restore all the former misery, and more.  And if you love me, as you profess to, you will not press me to do what is wrong; you will leave me to my melancholy, which at least is pure, instead of pulling me toward a tainted candy-coating of happiness.  Please go now; this is become an improper visit.”

“Let me stay—cannot I be your friend, if nothing else?”

She studied him for a moment before she said, “I think it would not satisfy you, and you would beg a crumb more of me with every visit, until before I knew it, I had slipped to what I just prevented myself from descending to.  Thus—I must say no, we cannot be friends.  Return to your sphere, marry a girl of your own class, who has not yet been through one of the kilns of life.  Good-bye, Raoul.”

Madame Devereux felt rather old in that moment; and so she reached out to curve her hand around the young man's face, and kissed him briefly on the cheek.  It reminded Raoul of a kiss from one of his aunts—mild, affectionate, and causing him to feel as though he had only ten years to his name.  He did not speak as he went toward the door, but when he had just put his hand to the knob, Christine said,

“It was childish, to think that a viscount and an opera singer, very recently only a chorus girl, could have married and been happy.  Society would have turned up its nose at me, and either you would have joined it, or you would have been hurt by it; and both would have made me unhappy.  You will be much wiser to tuck our little romance between the leaves of your memory-book as a boyhood passion, than to carry it about with you next your heart.”

His reply was a sad, “Fare thee well, Madame Devereux—my angel.  But I will return to you in half a year, perhaps, for I do not trust the strength of your noble resolve."

And so he was gone; her will had been tested, and its metal was true.  Further, she had been disappointed by Raoul's weakness, by his failure to act upon principle.

When Helene came into the room a few minutes later, she found her mistress in tears, her figure draped over the couch in a posture of dejection as she wept.  Helen sat beside the girl, took her in her arms, and asked, “The visitor was unwelcome, Madame?”

“No—yes—not at first, but later.  Oh, Helene—why has my life been picked out for singularity?  My renowned father, my voice that is supposed to be so wonderful, my chancing to sing at the Opera where there chanced to live M. Devereux... being made to marry M. Devereux, to give up my girlhood, to never have the normal progress of courtship and marriage... what more can there be?  I dread to know what dwells behind those clouds that obscure the future!  And why must one be disappointed by the people one has liked, and loved?  But there's one comfort—I've had a lesson, and I shan't wish for him any longer.  It has all been too much, and such a long time since I cried; I've been too numb for it, but Raoul's coming disturbed my heart from its hibernation... and now it is bruised.  And I am ashamed of myself, Helene!”

“Why, Madame?” asked the elder lady, with a soothing lilt.

“Because [Christine shuddered a little] I was so close to submitting to his wishes—I have had a fright.  I tell myself that I did right in the end, and did it very quickly, but it disturbs me that I should have even considered the alternative!”

“There's no good to come from dwelling upon it, Madame; you have only seen that you're human and have a human's weaknesses, but you also have enough strength to put weakness in its place, so to say.  It doesn't do any good to avoid looking at one's flaws, you know.”

That evening, Christine bade Helene summon Devereux to her room, and the housekeeper—her capacity really was more that of a housekeeper than maid—returned with him in tow, and gestured him into the boudoir.  His wife was in her usual place since her invalidity, and looking unusually girlish, as on the previous occasion mentioned in this chronicle, with her hair looser than during the day, and her white dressing gown in place of her usual black dress.  She was not all girlish innocence, however; by her expression, there was something bothering her, which conjecture was soon enough proven true.

“What is it?” asked her husband.

“Sit, please, monsieur,” was her reply, “for I must make a confession.”

He sat on the nearby hassock.  “Your confession, Madame?”

“You must first take off the mask,” she said.  When he said nothing, she repeated, “Take it off, monsieur!  I cannot speak as I must, to a statue!  I know what I shall see, and I do not care.”

Slowly, ever so slowly, he removed it.  “Are you satisfied—or do you fear nightmares?”

“Hush, monsieur—listen.  Helene brought in a caller to me today—Raoul, the Vicomte de Chagny.”

“What did he want?” roughly.

“Believing me free, he came, I collect, to ask me if I still loved him, and if I did, to ask if I would marry him.  Failing that—he reasoned that I was not truly married, and he tried to kiss me.  I did not allow it, monsieur, but at first I nearly did.  Then I told him to go; and that is everything.”

She glanced toward the rent visage, expecting to find wrath upon it; she saw none, but she could not tell what was there.

“Monsieur?”

“Do you love the viscount?”

A truthful, “No.”

“How do you find your damages, today?”

She was put into momentary confusion by the change of subject.  “My damages?  Oh—he—he took my hands, monsieur, and made the broken one hurt badly.”

The arm was held out for Devereux's inspection; he found nothing out of order.  Nevertheless, it pleased him to term the viscount a careless, bumbling idiot—within the confines of his own mind.  His next spoken words were, “It is nearly ten, Madame.  Shall I take you in to your bed?”

“If you are not worn out from lifting me so many times—that day—I should appreciate it, for Helene does not serve well as a prop.  We make an ill-coordinated pair, she and I.”

“I am sorry for it.  Also, I fail to comprehend the meaning of 'if you are not worn out,' etc.  Do you indicate that I am elderly and infirm?”

“Not quite elderly, perhaps, and not infirm, but I thought it might be taxing to one forty years my senior, to carry my weight so much.”

“Forty years—your senior!”  His progress was halted in the doorway.  “Madame—Christine, you need not fear for my endurance; I am not that much your senior by half.”

“What!  Monsieur?  Then you are—four-and-forty?”

“Nine-and-thirty.”

“Oh!  Will you put me down, please?”

Devereux continued into the room, and laid her upon her bed.  Then, turning up the gas and leaning close to the sconce—“Do you still fancy that I number my years at sixty-five?”

The bright light—she had hitherto always seen him in shadow—showed, indeed, a much younger person than she had for two years believed him to be: his skin had not yet developed the profuse wrinkles of advancing age, while his jetty hair had not yet begun to fade to grey.  It was frightening, and she moved backward, pulling the bedclothes up over herself as she did.

“I beg your pardon!” she exclaimed nervously.  “I did not intend to insult you—I had a silly, inexplicable preconceived notion that you were much older.  Good-night, Monsieur Devereux.”

“Good-night, Madame.”

She did not drift to sleep immediately he had gone; there was too much to think of.

Forty!  Not quite forty!  How it changed her perception of him... and her attitude toward him.  Sixty—it was simple enough to live with sixty, for the early infatuation had been over some time ago, and it seemed impossible that anything had taken its place but some regard, in view of his care for her injuries and his reaction to her confession.

But thirty-nine!  It put the picture in a different frame entirely, maybe changing how he thought of her.  Much more likely that almost forty would develop something to take infatuation's place, than that solidly sixty would!  And was there anything—did he have some feeling regarding her, which he kept concealed?
And—forty!  There might be more than fifty years now to her sentence—longer even than he had been alive!  And only fourteen years between them... yet... he had honored her request.  There, there—nothing to fear.

That being the case, she thought she had very little left to fear.  Devereux could not touch her; Raoul had no power any more to affect her; all might go undisturbed.  She would fall deeper into her groove of domesticity, so deep that she could not see the outer world over its sides, and thus would scarcely know what she missed, and scarcely miss it.  Not a happy conclusion, but she might at least find a day-to-day contentment in her share of what society calls “woman's sphere,” while allowing her husband to live on in whatever he chose to term his own sphere—separate existences, joined only by the continuity of the roof under which they took place.

A fine illusion, perhaps, yet an illusion fated to be dispelled by circumstance, the whims of an architect, and Devereux.

On the following afternoon, Christine was wakened from a half-sleep by a knocking at her door.  The knocker could not be Helene, who had already established a habit of entering unannounced—a habit which had irritated her former employer to no end, but which her present one, craving intimate feminine company, found delightful.  No, it could not be Helene; therefore, it must be Devereux, and so she called, “What is it, monsieur?”

“May I enter?”

“Very well.”  She did not especially desire him to, for fear that he might come to take the increased interaction for granted, but to turn him away would be rude, in view of recent services rendered.

In he came, and stood before her.  “Madame, if you will permit me to show you—I have discovered something which might interest you.”

“What is it?”

“You must see it; can you walk yet?”

She shook her head, and soon found herself held once more as she had been the night before.  Devereux carried her from the room, down the hall, and into his study—where she began to be alarmed for no certain reason.  However, he only went to the back of the room, where a bookcase had been shifted away from the wall to reveal a glazed door.  They passed through this door, and once on the other side, Christine saw that she had been brought into a small, walled garden, quite overgrown.  The flagstone floor was in places covered by a thick and variegated carpet of moss, while in others it was encroached upon by a rosebush which had evidently grown bored with keeping to its proper shape and dimensions.  This bush had decided, too, to unite with ivy for the sake of exploring the reaches of the high wall, a locality which seemed ideal for its continued thrivance.  Other plants, too, resided in the abandoned space—here boxwood, there lilac, elsewhere violets, heliotrope, and daisies, the flowers all growing where they would about the more stately and permanent shrubbery.

“Did you only just find this?” asked the girl, marveling.

“I did; the bookcase had proven its location inconvenient, and in moving it, I observed a door behind.  It shall be left unobstructed, of course—if you wish to use it.”

Where her contented separation, if she could access the garden only by the door in the study?  But it seemed a shame to leave it... and so a treaty was signed: the Right of Trespass—and Christine realised something decidedly peculiar: that here was a mutual experience, removed from a war to determine the stronger willpower, not an urgent situation.  Upon this realisation, she was of a sudden too confined, too close, and again she gave that agitated,

“M. Devereux—please set me down at once!”

There was a low wall separating one planting from the flagstones, and it was on this that he set her, asking, “Have you so soon changed your mind, then—am I to close off this space?”

“No, certainly not.  I only... you must see that it is very strange for me, monsieur, to be carried about and held, so, when—only consider my position!” she cried, unable to restrain herself.  “I am all confusion!  At first, you were a mad tyrant and I was wretched; then, you were uninterested, and I resigned; recently, you have been... kind, after a manner, and... good to me.  While I—I know not how to act under this newest phase.  I would be as content as ever I can be to continue in the separation of the past months, yet you seem unwilling that I should do so.  I have been your slave, your housekeeper, your tenant, your secretary—what is my role to be now?”

Nearly he gave an audacious reply; however, her attitude caused him to think better of it, and he said, “You may have your choice, Madame; I ask only that you carry papers for me as you have in the past, and that you spend perhaps five evenings each week in the drawing room.  Also—you will keep Helene Boudrot, I assume?”

“I doubt that Helene would leave even if I ordered her to.  As to the others, I shall do as you wish.”

“There is a final request: that if, as you say, you have been, not wretched but resigned, you shall put aside your black.”

Thus commenced the third stage of Christine's married life: exit the housekeeper-secretary; enter Madame Devereux, lady of the house.  Christine Devereux, who attired herself in greys and even a few colors, albeit dullish ones.  She was only twenty-five, but she was seldom girlish, carrying herself instead with a new dignity of station, which was not unbecoming, and which caused Helene to think, Something must be changed between Madame and the master—though a person can hardly tell if it's an understanding, or a misunderstanding!

Slowly, the dark, old drawing room took on a new appearance as Christine, finding that she was to spend a not-inconsiderable portion of her time therein, tried to make it a more hospitable space.  New draperies were the first change, tattered crimson brocade exchanged for lighter damask with a pale green-blue-grey hue, like that of a stormy sea.  Next the moth-eaten red carpets were replaced with ones of green and gold, and she had new cloth put over the cushions of the old furniture, which really was not so hideous as it had first seemed, once the rest of the room had been rectified.  With the heavy, dark paintings replaced by lighter ones, watercolours from her mother's hand, the room was made rather handsome; and one day, she even dared to cut some of the petite pink roses from the secret garden, as she called it, and put them in a vase on a stand behind the sopha.

And as Christine and the drawing room had changed, so had Erik Devereux, the flames of bitter anger and vengeance within him dying down under the influences of company, more civilised surroundings, and—most important of all—kindness.

[Several months after Christine's accident.]

Christine was pulled from sleep by a thud which had, of a surety, not originated in the realm of dreams.  What was it?  Was Cecile up on a nocturnal excursion, and had she knocked something over?  But no—she could feel the cat's warmth on the bed beside her.  It was not Helene, for she had gone home hours before; she had heard her.  Perhaps something had merely shifted, settled, somewhere in the house?  She would reassure herself through a brief investigation.

Rising, she pulled a wrap around her shoulders and lit a candle before stepping into the dark hall.  All seemed normal—but, no!  The candlelight caught in a darker spot at the end of the hall: the door to Devereux's study was ajar—a curious thing, when he always kept it closed against Cecile.  He must have forgotten to close it, so she would close it for him before returning to bed.  And perhaps—catching a glimpse of moonlight through the glass of the garden door—she might stand in the snowy garden for just a moment first, for it would be such a hushed, dreamlike place in the middle of a winter night.

This she did, and going back inside with a pleasant shiver was about to leave the room, when her candle's glow and her attention fell upon something which had been laid on the desk—an envelope, with MADAME DEVEREUX across the front back.  Evidently, it was for her... it was odd, however, for he had never written thus to her before... ought she to read it?  Decorum said no; Foreboding's goad was the stronger.  She opened the envelope, and read through the letter which it contained.

Mme Christine Devereux,

I have little enough to say, and refuse to expand that little with effusions which disgust  all sense; thus, I shall reach my point directly, without more than this as preamble.

Three years ago, nearly, I did you a heinous wrong: no man may call it his right to  coerce a woman to marry him.  I apologise for my crime, Madame—I repent, and an I could, I  would return to you your name, your former station, these past three years—all that of which I  have robbed you.  However, no man can so far turn back the clock, and so but one option  remains.  Before I detail this to you, it is my moment for confession.

Christine, you may cringe away from my words, yet I must have you know: that I love  you, and have—more each time I see, or hear, or think of you—for many months.  I had hoped,  in the months following your incapacitation, to teach you of this, but even if you had known it,  what would have been the use?  For hearts are not magnets; a pull toward one is not always  mirrored in the other—

I see my position as an encumbrance, and I see but that one way to right my wrongs.   Tonight, therefore, my earthly existence shall cease; you shall be free, to marry as you will.  You  are still young, Christine, and the papers below this, if you take them to the M Marvaise whom  you have seen many times before, will guarantee that your youth—and age—are not spent in  poverty—you shall not be impoverished; and if you do marry, it shall serve as insurance against  cautious relatives.  With regard to myself—as your connection to me may  become known,  through some means, I shall by some means render myself unrecognisable, that none may  connect Madame Devereux, whose husband perished in an accident, to the phantom who  haunted the Opera.

I have but two final things to say to you, one of which is: Thank you, my wife, for telling  me of the viscount's call, &c.  Your courage—it cannot have been an easy thing to tell—,  honesty, and honor command the depth of my admiration—and my love.

Thank you, as well, for your loyalty to what you view as duty: I have known humanity as  I never knew it previously, have been not a thing, nor a fright, nor a beast, but a man.

You know all of importance, and there is now nothing to say but to entreat that you  remember with charity, from time to time,

Erik Devereux

The world was unsteady beneath Christine's feet as she numbly put the letter into her pocket, but she managed not to stumble—she must not stumble—she must go out, must find him, for his perception had been incorrect.  Now she knew, of a certainty—knew that if he accomplished his purpose that night, she would be thrown again into that misery of three years ago, and would wear her weeds long.

She flew back to her own room, dressed as quickly as she could, though for a feather she would have tossed propriety to the merry breezes and, like the boy in the rhyme, run through the streets in her nightgown.  In five minutes her dress was on, her boots hooked, and a cape thrown over her shoulders; another minute saw her descend from the house, her hurry dissipating as she realised the many ways Devereux could have taken.  But the snow was falling, had been falling for some time, to judge by the layer over everything, and a set of footprints led from her door, out into the street.  She began to pursue it at a run, wondering how long was his lead upon her... it must be fifteen minutes, if not twenty-five, so she ran as quickly as she might over the slippery streets.  Even at that, if he was very close, she would not catch him in time—in which case, she must hope that he had taken his time, was extending the last minutes of his life.

On and on she ran, until though she felt as though she could go no farther, still her legs kept on with their even gait, seemingly functionally detached from her mind.  Once the footprints were lost in a sheltered alleyway, and it was several minutes before she was able to find them again in a side street farther down the alley.  From there, they led on toward the frozen river, in an area where there were several abandoned boats, and led down to a pier where one of those boats was moored.  As she stepped onto the pier, she glanced over at a divotted area in the snow, and beyond it, down the embankment—where she saw a snowy mound which was neither boulder nor discarded barrel.

Christine approached it—brushed away the snow—felt an overcoat under her fingers.  Through the snow-lit night, she saw a face—could not distinguish its features—reached out....  There was the indented cheekbone, the rutted forehead, the twisted nose—it was Devereux.  And—alive, though the pulse was feeble.  Alive!  He must have slipped on ice, and perhaps knocked himself unconscious in falling.  Blessed ice!  But that was, after all, trivial; she must somehow discover some method by which she could move him home, lest he should catch his death of exposure.  But past midnight, what might a single woman do?  She could never pull his weight upon a sledge for such a distance, nor of course could she carry him.  Nothing was to be done, it seemed, but to hammer at the door of a nearby residence until its inhabitant woke, and then to plead with him for assistance.

She did, thinking that a blacksmith's seemed promising.  A second-floor window was thrown up, and from within a large, sleepily peevish voice called out, “Who's there—here, ma'm'selle, what do you want, a-rousting a fellow out at this hour?”

“Please, monsieur—my husband has had some kind of accident, and shall freeze to death.  Can you help me to carry him home, [such a distance] that way?”

The man grumbled, but he soon unlocked his door and made his ponderous way over to the pier, where Christine had removed her cape to put over Devereux.

“A bit tipsy-like, was he?” asked the drowsy one with a yawn as he took in the scene.

“I hope not,” said Christine, noncommittally.  If the man wished to believe Devereux drunk, she would be saved the time and trouble of explaining the entirety of the circumstances.

“Well, seems as I could haul him a good ways—not what you might call stout of frame, madame.”  He bent down and lifted the other man up with little effort—just as easily as Devereux himself had carried Christine.

“Eh—what's a pair of gentlefolk the likes of you about wandering down here?  And at such an hour!”

What was she to say to that?  Call him certainly intoxicated, and she lost respectability.  On the other hand, tell the truth—suicide—and she raised intrigue, and to explain all she must discuss what might well incline the man against lending her his aid.  So—

“We are newly arrived in Paris, from the country, and we were separated in a crowd this afternoon.  I returned home with my mother-in-law, but my husband never arrived, so I came out to search for him.”

“Bah!  Country mouse,” was the smith's eloquent reply.  “You might go strolling at midnight in a little country village, madame, but it's not so wise in Paris.  Wonder what got m'sieur—pickpockets, happen likely, or their sort.”

The return, though made at a walk, seemed to be quicker than the outbound trip, and before very much time had passed, the trio of travelers had reached the Devereuxs' house, and Christine was leading the blacksmith up the stairs and—it suddenly occurring to her that she did not know which room was Devereux's, the most strictly sensible thing was to have the man put him in her own.  Too, she could maneuver through her own room in the dark, and she was anxious to preserve the darkness, that the smith might be prevented from seeing the awful thing which he carried.

Opening her door—“In here, monsieur.”  She lit a dim candle in a rear corner of the room.  “Can you see?  I am sorry there is no more light, but I have only this one candle.”  It was unnecessary to mention the gas, or the supply of candles in her wardrobe.

“Eh, I guess I can see fine enough to put a fellow down; this the place?  There you are, then, madame.”

“I thank you, monsieur, a hundred, a thousand times!  Shall I show you to the door?”

“Nay, nay; I figure I can find it—and you would rather stay with monseigneur, eh madame?  And are you certain there's nothing more that you need?”

“I am certain; good-night!”

He left with a good-natured laugh, and Christine, upon hearing the slam of the front door, lit the gas and went to stand by the side of her bed, whereupon lay Devereux.  His coat was wet; she went at once to remove it.  He was cold, too, so she stirred up the banked fire, and went to hunt for tea in the kitchen.  It was procured, and she took the kettle up with her to obviate the necessity of resuscitating the kitchen stove; she would use the upstairs fire, instead.  While waiting for the kettle to heat, she chafed Devereux's hands, and under the influence of this, the warm room, and the smoke from the fire, which had decided to be sullen, he began to revive, shifting slightly.  At this, Christine found that she had time again for emotion, and felt very relieved, as well as bit inclined toward shakiness from the nervous and physical strain of the past interval.  She had been more heavily taxed than she had known.

Devereux wakened presently to a most unexpected scene.  There was Christine's fireplace, with the sketch of her father above it—and it was not the snowy pier on which he lay, but a bed... where was he?  Nothing fit, for there too was the sound of a kettle, and of a woman's skirts rustling as she rose... she was now a shadow before the fire as she poured from the kettle... and then, of all people, he heard his wife saying,

“Monsieur, are you awake?”

He pulled himself stiffly up and looked at her: she was dressed, but with her hair loose and tangled, as if from wind.

“I... do not... understand,” he said.  “I think... I intended... to... have died....  How came I... not to?”

“The closing of the hall door awakened me, so I went to see if all was well.  The study door was open, so I went in, found the letter on your desk, and read it—and went out to try to stop you, monsieur.  Fortunately, there had been fresh snow on the ground when you went out, and I was able to follow you with little trouble.  You seem to have slipped on a patch of ice and hit your head against something, which effectually kept you from carrying out your plan.”

“Christine.”

“Yes, monsieur?”

“You read the entire letter?”

“I did.”

“Do you think me a fool?”

“What I think, monsieur, must be discussed later.  Now, if you will be so good as to drink something hot,” passing a cup of tea to him.

He drank, and would have left when finished, but Christine's sharp eyes had observed that where flesh was of its ordinary hue, his color was rising, so she restrained him with a hand upon his shoulder.

“No, monsieur, you must not; you have already been chilled enough, and your room shall be cold.”

“I can hardly remain here, Madame; an I recall correctly, this is your chamber.”

“Indeed, I care not.  Now, shall I retire to my couch, or ought I to remain here?”

Her stubbornness was exasperating to Devereux, who—like many men—supposed his health to be more robust than it was, and he tried to rise, tried to explain, but he was pressed back again even as he protested, “If nothing else will appeal to you, Madame—the impropriety!”

“Oh, monsieur,” she laughed lightly, “you forget: we are married.  There is no impropriety in the matter if you are here, and I in my boudoir; surely, even the stiffest aunt would not disapprove.  So you must humor me, and my paranoia, because I refuse to have kept you from suicide or death from exposure, only to have you catch death of cold in your own house!”

“You intend kindness; intending such, you are accidentally cruel.”

The words pained her, but if illness were to set in, as she thought looked not unlikely, she must not speak the phrases formed by her heart, which would surely put him into a vulnerable state of excitement.

“Do not call me cruel, monsieur, for—”

“For it was not you, took me against my will, bound me to you?  No!”  Although bitterly vehement, the tone was not directed toward her—rather, toward himself, and he followed it with a gentler, “It is my due; this was not your dessert.”

She could not leave him in such a dismal state; she took his hand for a moment and said.  “I would not this long have been happy as Raoul's wife, monsieur; it is well that I was not married to him, as I surely would have been.  Hush!  I have not been unhappy, these past months; they have been pleasant, more so than the balls, outings, and parties of a viscount's set could ever be.  Comfort I enjoy as much as any woman; grand luxury does not please me as it pleases some; the former I have, the latter I desire not.  You imagine that beneath my surface I hate you, or loathe you at least—I do not.  Good night... Erik.”

The interview done, Christine went to her boudoir, donned her nightdress once more, and lay down on the couch, spreading her dressing gown over herself.  Something rustled within its pocket; she pulled from the folds of fabric Devereux's letter and by the light of her candle began to read it over—and this time, the danger over, she was able to read and understand what he had written.  He loved her, he called her his wife!  How had he supposed, that with such a mark impressed upon her, she could be glad of his eternal absence?  How had he supposed that she could be glad of it at all?

If not for that patch of ice... if not for the slam of the front door!  When she had removed his coat, she had discovered in one pocket a phial of arsenic, and in another a box of matches.  The plan for self-destruction was evident: he had intended to enter one of the abandoned boats, to take the arsenic, and last to set the boat on fire, that his body would be unidentifiable.  Christine shivered, not wholly from the chill of the boudoir.  She would have awakened in the morning, Helene would have helped her to dress, she would have gone down to breakfast, wondered why Devereux appeared not... she eventually have climbed the stairs, looked into the library... discovered the letter... known herself to have been too late.  The present would have felt ravaged, the future barren—too late she would have realized his—Devereux's—Erik's place in her life, too late realized that Love had this time crept to her on tip-toe, taking the time to grow a bud before it bloomed.  After the firecracker-burst of the viscount-romance, she had failed to see it, green, unopened, and unassuming as it had been—but now!

She would not easily be parted from the eventide conversations, which having begun months ago with awkward proxy, were now become easy, companionable affairs, drifting to this or that as they would, doubling back, straying to distant lands; nor did she wish to be relieved of the autumn days when they sat in the secret garden at their own tasks, and all was right with the world... nor the rare, rare smiles which she found directed toward her, once in a precious blue moon... nor the man who had been so careful, so skilled, so kind when she had been injured... who had not punished her for her near-misdeed of Raoul's visit, but had even admired her for her confession of it!

At last, Christine managed to fall asleep, only to be woken half an hour later by violent coughing from the other room.  She went to the door, opened it, slipped inside—

“Erik?” in a whisper.

“Quiet your mind, madame; I chanced to inhale a fragment of dust.”

“I beg your pardon,” she murmured, and went back her temporary bed, where after another wakeful period, she slumbered.

In the morning, Helene entered the boudoir to find her mistress sleeping in a cramped posture upon the couch, one hand resting trailing down on the floor.

“Madame!” was the housekeeper's astonished exclamation.  “What are you doing here—what has happened to your bed—are you ill?”

The lady of the house awoke, sat up drowsily, and replied, “I have had—an interesting night, Helene.  It is by the slightest chance that you do not find me a widow this morning.”

“What!  Did Monsieur meet with an accident?”

“He did, which is part of the reason that I am not a widow.”

“Madame, you speak no sense!”  And the older woman laid her hand against the younger's brow.  “Are you certain that you are not ill?”

“I am quite well, and I speak perfect sense.  Last night, I was awakened by a sound, and upon venturing out into the house to investigate its cause, I found a note in the study, addressed to myself.  Of course, I read it—it explained the noise, certain enough, with an ominous message: 'Tonight, therefore, my earthly existence shall cease.'

“What was I to do?  I dressed, I ran out the door, and followed the footprints in the snow until I found Erik, unconscious near a pier with abandoned boats, following which I hammered at the door of a blacksmith until he came to help me; he carried him back here for me, and I insisted upon his being put into my room, for I could quickly bring back the fire—also, I do not know which other is his.  Hence, the reason I spent the night here.”

“You look uncommonly well, Madame, for having slept in so uncomfortable a place.  You did not take cold in the night, I hope?”

“No—no!  I only—Helene, do you think me mad?”

“Why should I?”

Christine put her fingers up over her mouth, looking very much like a child with a secret, and from behind this shelter said, “Because I should have been a most despondent widow; I am—I find that I love him!  Oh, Helene, am I ridiculous?”

“Many women love their husbands.  What shall you wear today, Madame?”

There was in Christine's wardrobe, put out of the way behind the grey and otherwise dull dresses, a gown of white cashmere, which became her wonderfully.  She had purchased it two years ago on a rare whim, knowing that she had no use for it, yet hoping, hoping—and here was reason, though far from what she had hoped for, so she replied to the housekeeper, “The white cashmere.”

It was fetched; she was dressed, and as Helene went to put her hair into its usual severe twists, she interrupted the familiar process. “Don't, Helene; let me do it, please.”

Helene stepped back, and watched Madame put up her own hair, in a style much looser and younger than what she had worn hitherto.  She was a new, a lovely Madame Devereux when she had done, a far cry from the dejected girl in black, the lady of the tight hair and sober gowns, this young woman with her curls and white cashmere.

When Devereux came down to breakfast, he found a stranger already at the table.  He started upon entering the room, in fact, so changed was she as she looked up at him with a lively, “Good morning, monsieur!”

After a moment of speechless perplexity, eventually came, “Good morning, madame.”

“You have not taken ill, I hope, following the... events of last night?"

“I am quite as well as ordinarily.”

“I am glad, for last night I had feared it might be otherwise.  But do come in!  Why do you stand there, staring at me as if you knew me not?  Come, sit!”

Devereux came and sat, at the opposite end of the table from Christine, who promptly rose, remonstrating, “Surely, you will not sit so far from me?  I can barely speak to you without shouting,” and with that established herself nearer to him.

“Is not this table absurd?  So many seats for two, who never entertain company!”

“Perhaps you wish me to make myself scarce in the evenings, so that it may see a use more fitted to its design?”

“No, monsieur, because I enjoy our evenings, and I would not wish to discontinue them.  But enough of this—there is something else which I wish to say to you, regarding last night.”

“Indeed; I share the wish.  Since you are finished, adjourn with me to the drawing room, for I have no hunger, but a great thirst for information.”

He was adamant: he would not remain in the dining room and have his breakfast, but must speak to her, so, inwardly a bit exasperated by the irrationality of men in general, and this one in particular, Christine obeyed his injunction, calling as she went for Helene to clear the dining room and keep some breakfast for Devereux.

Once in the drawing room, the lady seated herself in her preferred chair, while the man stood behind a chair across from her.  It seemed that he was in too much of a state to sit.

“What did you wish to ask?” she inquired, “what information did you desire?”

“I should very much like to know why you, a generally sensible young woman, pursued me for more than a mile through snow and frigid temperatures, when you had read my letter?  And furthermore why, when you found me, you did not assume me dead and return to this house thus.”

Amused, she smiled.  “Monsieur, you possess a great deal of knowledge, but I do believe that of all of those many books which you have read, none were written concerning the subject of Woman.  Pity, for I think men could benefit greatly from a course of study in the female mind, and vice versa—but I wander from the issue at hand.  You ask why I pursued you; I say, that I pursued you because I did not care for you to die.”

“You are charitable, madame.”

“I am very little charitable.”

“Then why—”  he leaned forward slightly over the chair, his hands resting on its back “—did you go after me?  I offered personal liberty, financial independence, and withal a chance to have from your life what you ought to have had from the beginning.  Why did you willingly abandon them?”

Christine rose and drifted nearer to the chair as she replied, “I have no desire for personal liberty, thus no use for financial independence.  Nay, I am not sour because a few years have been chiseled from my youth—only, monsieur, I was horrified when I read your letter, and was unfathomably glad to have found it so soon, while deathly anxious lest so soon should be yet not soon enough.”

“Then you would not wish to part company?”

“No, monsieur.”

“The situation of the past sixmonth satisfies you?”

“As much as it can, only...”

She was now directly opposite him, the chair between them; she reached out, curled her fingertips around the edge of his mask, and susurrating “No more of this, monsieur,” pulled the piece from his face with a half-timid hand.  The grotesque features were before her, she saw them plainly in the bright room—saw Devereux's stiff, wary posture as he watched her.  He had no reason to fear, however: Christine stepped back without recoiling, laid the mask on a nearby table, and approached again, not quite as close—looked into his face, past the skin's varying purple-red hues and uneven textures, past the indented cheekbone and the abnormal convexity of the other, past the twisted nose, the rutted brow—to the eyes, which being clear grey in color and well set, were Nature's mark of mercy... she had never before looked into Devereux's eyes, hitherto always too frightened or too shy... and again she retreated, moving to the fireplace to busy herself with rearranging the coals.  Note the difference: not to rearrange the coals, but to busy herself with that activity.

“Madame,” said Devereux suddenly, though he moved not.

Madame remained bent over the fire, but gave reply: “Yes?”

“You say that you acted not out of charity, that you would be made unhappy by my no longer continuing here, that you were horrified by the prospect of my death, and that you are as satisfied as you can be by the manner in which we have carried on for the past months—but this says rather little, as I think you know; you might just as well say it to Helene.”

“Is there any reason, monsieur, why I should not regard you in much the same light?  She is my day companion, you my evening; she is paid in gold, you in service.”

“Must you recall that period to the conversation?  What has it to do with the present?”

Putting away the poker, she straightened to look his way once more.

“Nothing, monsieur—nothing but as it serves for foundation.”

“A frail foundation, easily cracked, or an oppressively heavy and solid one?”

“I know not; it seems so distant, veiled by a thick and apathetic fog.”

“What is the fog?”

“The time between the first sixmonth and the last.”

There came an interval of no conversation, then, in which Christine betook herself to the back of the room, where she seemed to feel it her duty meticulously to dust the leaves of a houseplant, while Devereux stood at one of the side windows and stared out into the abandoned side street.  Her dilemma was that of uncertainty and propriety: ought she to take it upon herself to make the grand confession?  Her companion found himself occupied with uncertainty, as well, but of a different nature: had she gone after him because it was her human duty, or because it was her own desire?  If the former, what a grim future!  If the latter—how strong had been the urge for pursuit?  He must discover—he could not hang in this state of limbo for the rest of his days, or perhaps even for that one day.

“Christine!”

Christine turned, watched him with expectation as he strode toward her.
“Christine, we have had enough of this dallying.  I have told you of my view—and now I must know yours.”

“What is your view, monsieur?”  She continued to whisk dust from the plant's leaves as she spoke, until he, distracted by her little flurry of motion, arrested her hands and held them still in his own.

“It is that I love you, Christine.  Do you disbelieve?  For I have said this to you before, years ago... I was mistaken.  I had never known love then, and so I mistook your lovely appearance and sound, with my feeling of desolation eased.  You were not my concern then—not your comfort, your happiness; do you see the difference, when now—I attempted to lay down my life for you, believing that your state would be improved by it.  And as you halted that attempt, you have now a debt to pay... madame-my-wife.”

“What is it?” in a whisper.

Erik Devereux's voice was even as he replied, “Tell me—if my affections are returned.”

Now—at last!  Had not the morning seemed days?

“Yes, Erik.”

“Then may I put my arms about you, dearest?”

Such a funny question—he was so utterly uneducated, so hesitant!  But it was not Nature that had made him so; nay, it was mistaken Nurture, of the sort which was no nurture at all—and so the lady laughed not, but murmured, “Yes, Erik,” as she herself gave embrace, as she had never dreamed of doing in the years before.  And so he returned the gesture, and though his clasp was at first like that of a child supporting a delicate shell, it grew stronger—for Christine was no sea-shell, but a woman, his wife.

The embrace was a heaven for both, as the authors tell us, but Christine felt revulsion and panic rise within her when Erik looked into her face and placed one finger beneath her chin, tilting it up....  She leaned back, but his other arm was yet around her shoulders, pulling her nearer—too near!  She gasped; the pressure eased slightly, and as he met her eyes he assumed a understanding countenance.

“Poor girl,” were his words, “but it isn't so any longer—no more!”

So he bent forward once more, and with care, pressed his mottled lips to hers, which were white.  Their color returned, however—for the other kiss, which had once more burned upon her lips moments ago, was tempered, soothed away by this one.  And so she returned the kiss, wondering for an instant what it was to him—forty years' drought of love, suddenly broken.

Helene came in at that moment, having forgotten that her mistress and master were in the drawing room.  It was her gasp which recalled these two personages from the world of whispers and embraces.

"Helene!" exclaimed Christine, pulling her arms down from Devereux's shoulders to hang weakly amongst the folds of her skirt.  Devereux, meanwhile, had apparently decided to make the shift in status public, because he caught her around the waist and led her to the other end of the room, where Helene stood yet.

"May I introduce you to Madame Devereux—my wife?"

"Why, monsieur!" Helene cried dramatically.  "Do you imply that Madame is not your sister?  I was so certain....  I never knew you to be a married man!"

Erik Devereux gave a triumphant laugh at her jest.  "I am, Helene."

"Then I wish you well and happiness, monsieur, Madame, and—and I must see to the kitchen floor, if you will pardon me," archly.

So she left, and once she had, Devereux seated himself on the sopha, where Christine joined him, establishing herself upon his knees with a half-coquettish glance.  When, after a few moments, he began, "Christine—" she interrupted by placing her hands on either side of his face and saying, "Do not ask it.  Erik, I could have no greater love for another, were he but three years my senior and as perfectly formed as a statue.  Now, was I correct; was that what you were going to say to me?"

"It was, but there is now another thing.  In the view of the church and the state, we are married—but you know the truth as well as I do, and perhaps better: that your hand was forced, that you would rather have taken almost anyone but myself as your husband.  Christine," mustering courage, "do you wish it done again—done as it ought to be?"

"It is dear of you to offer, but unnecessary.  The thing has been done."

"Do you truly believe such?"

She turned her head away from his interrogation, but had eventually to confess, "No, Erik, but I will not call upon you to stand before a man... or do you ask for yourself?" quizzically.  "Do you indicate that you wish to have it as you once thought you would?"

"No, madame-my-wife.  I never thought of marriage as possible, unless to one of the girls in the menagerie, an affair arranged by the owner for the sake of publicity.  But—I must tell you something, Christine, which I have kept secret for the entirety of our acquaintance, but which I think....  Nearly twenty years ago, when I was perhaps two-and-twenty, the menagerie called upon a small seaside town, and one day as I stood in my imprisonment, I saw a young girl and an older man walking along the street.  She was perhaps six or seven years of age, a blithesome child skipping at her father's side and laughing a laugh so fluid that it was almost a song to flow in harmony with the dancing of her dark curls.  What a lovely woman she would grow up to be, if she continued as she had done for the past years... and before she was gone from my sight, I heard her father admonish her for her excessive exuberance: 'Christine!  Is this proper behavior for the daughter of the maestro Jan Daae?'"

"Erik!"

"She was the sole spot of sunlight in my life... and then, nearly fifteen years later, I heard her voice echoing down through the dust of the catacombs, and I heard whispers that she was Jan Daae's daughter...."

"I remember that there was once a menagerie in the town; I asked father if he would not take me, but he refused on the grounds that it was not for little girls to see.  Only think—I might have seen you, had I gone.... and I should have recognised you at the Opera....  It is strange to think of, isn't it?"

"Indeed, but it is irrelevant to the original question.  Christine, will you marry me—again?"

The woman stared steadily down at him from her perch.  "Do you wish it?"

“Yes, my darling, I do.”

“Then—yes, I will.”

Several moments, and then: “When, Erik?”

“Will you this afternoon?”

“I would this moment, if you wished it.”
With a sudden and almost violent sigh, “Perhaps you ought not, but request annulment.  You, so young and blooming; I so bleak, so grey; it is May and December.”

Her gaze was the hybrid of teasing and reproachful.  “December?  No, Erik, not December—only August, or perhaps late July.  You are forty, I five-and-twenty, which makes only fifteen years' difference, and that it not very odd at all, for society permits men to keep their youth longer than women.  A man may be at forty what a woman is at eight or nine-and-twenty.  Do you know, you quite frightened me that night when I said I thought you were sixty-five, and you replied—oh, in such a tone, so gravely comical, so ironic—you replied, 'Nine-and-thirty'!”

“It frightened you?”

“Yes, indeed—for I had grown used the idea of a man who was old enough to be my father, or perhaps even my grandfather; such a person, I felt, would have quickly realized that his romantic feeling for me was quite a silly thing, and he would have found himself over the business and ready to have me as granddaughter-niece alone, perhaps to brighten his elderly days.  But when I learned that my husband was not nearly in his dotage, but in his prime—the idea of a man, instead of a grandfather, was—intimidating.”

“I understand, I think.  And will you explain to me that other time when you suddenly requested me to put you down, in the secret garden?”

“Again, I was a little frightened—you carrying me, and showing me that spot... it was something that any couple might do, and because any couple might do it, and because of that it came to me to wonder if you and I should continue in the trend toward the typical... it was such a very intimate thing....  Embarrassment, I imagine, was my primary feeling then.  But now, monsieur, you must explain a thing to me: why were you not furious with me when I told you that I had nearly—kissed—the viscount, and why did you only scowl later?”

“The lack of fury—because you had restrained yourself and done right where you might have done wrong, and when so many women would have pursued the viscount's love.  As for the scowl, I believe it to have been given around the time when you said that the viscount had, in taking your hands, given you not a little pain in your injured wrist—which angered me, for the clumsy puppy of an idiot should have seen the bandage, should have taken caution, should have seen from your face that you were in pain—as I saw upon entering the room that evening!”

“You are very observant of me.”

“Very in love with you, Christine.”

“And Love considers the lover second to the love; Raoul satisfied his own feelings before he turned his consideration toward mine.  I must tell you: I forced myself to wonder, in that time, whether I did not prefer being your patient to being his pet; I did and do.”

"Mama, I was walking down by Rue de A---------- this morning, and saw a large building, which looked to be in sad disrepair.  I asked a passing girl what it was, and she said, 'Why, don't you know?  It is the old Opera—haunted, mademoiselle!  They say it is haunted by a shade all in black but for a white mask, who rampages through its galleries thundering wrath—but who, when the moon is new and darkness full, wanders mournfully, calling a distant, "Christine!  Christine!  Christine!" as if searching for someone who has been lost.'  The girl called the shade the Phantom of the Opera, which certainly isn't a very inventive name for a ghost that haunts an old operahouse.  You have lived in Paris for most of your life, Mama—do you know the story?  Can you tell me more than the girl could?"
Christine looked at her eldest daughter, from whom knowledge of the incidents had been kept, who was her father in a woman's form, but without the deformity.
"I can tell you a great deal more.  First—did the girl tell you of the shade's life?"
"She said that he dwelt in a sort of maze below the theatre—the could not walk the surface of the earth because he had no face—but he had a heart of some kind, and fell in love with a singer, and wanted her to come down to his maze-world.  Then there was an accident, or perhaps it was no accident at all—either way, there was a fire, and the singer just escaped with her other lover, and the man died in the inferno."
"That is the legend?  I must tell your father... he will perhaps find it amusing.  Oh, Emelie, the man never died, for the girl promised to marry him, and so her lover's life was spared, and she and the Phantom escaped, as well.  They were married in name, and she was miserable... until she was resigned... and one day, she injured herself in disembarking from a carriage... and then her husband was very tender toward her, and kind, and she learned to tolerate him.  He did not know that she pined no more for freedom, so after a time he thought to free her.  He wrote a letter to her, telling her of his plan—and of his love for her... and by the merest chance, she happened to be awakened that night, and heard him leave, found the letter, and flew after him, for suddenly she knew that she loved him—and she found him before it was too late, and brought him home, and they lived happily ever after, or as much as a couple can in daily life."
"Mama, you don't mean—surely, Papa is not that man, and you not the singer?"
"But surely we are, my dear, and if you doubt it, you may inquire of him.  I am sorry to disappoint your taste for the romantic by dispelling the myth of the rampaging, wandering shade, but do you not think it is much happier this way?"