Tango
Right. Let's see if this works...
The first thing Erik knew was an extraordinary warmth permeating his entire body, and a dim, infinite sense of peace. He drifted down through the last few moments of near-sleep, drinking in this unexpected gift as greedily as a freakish child whose cage had been left out in the sun. continue reading >>It was always half-dark behind the burlap mask of the sack, but on an early morning like this one, the sun could slant past the bars of his cage and pierce through the slits in the sack. He would shut his eyes against it, and then the light would become gentler, spreading in a languid glow over his demon-face, stroking him with a lover’s tender hands. Yet it was not just his face that was turned to the sun now. Erik felt its warm caress on his chest, on his thighs...
His heart lurched, and his eyes flew open.
Christine.
Like a sleepwalker at a cliff-edge, Erik realised he woke up a moment from mortal peril. There was no sun; the room was still dark with the bluish shadows of pre-dawn.
The warmth he felt came from Christine.
Her tiny delicate body was curled against him, a cascade of dark curls tumbling forward over her face. Erik was suddenly, disturbingly conscious of each ridge of her spine where it met his chest through the fabric of his shirt, of the proximity of the sweat-damp little hairs on her neck, caught under the collar. His own shirt on Christine’s... He fought for a breath.
Memory came as an explosion of white, an unbelievable confusion of sensations he could not untangle one from another, did not want to. For one delirious moment he believed it, and wondered whether he could have possibly pleased her, and then whether she had been hurt by his clumsy demands; he felt newly made, a paradox: at once anxious and triumphant. Above all of that was the simple, incredible truth. Christine, his Christine had come back to him – she loved him!...
Then the moment was over, and he remembered.
A sick terror strangled the peace Erik had felt, turning his own skin into a cold shell. He could move again; he rolled back. Icy sweat doused him where Christine’s soft, warm body had been.
He had brought her here. Brought her to this.
He staggered to the floor, away from the bed. His lingering desire was a monstrous thing he could not control. God, he was naked... Christine – her hands – he had wanted her to touch – he had dragged up here, screaming, exactly as in his nightmares – she had told him she could not leave – she’d kissed his awful face, and then – oh God. The world swayed and Erik nearly fell, only catching himself at the last moment on the top of the chair. His heel slipped on a piece of clothing; he lifted his foot: Christine’s dress.
Erik stood and stared down at it, his chest heaving. There were black smudges of dust all over her skirts, from when she had scrambled away from him down in the store-room. A couple of buttons were missing; was that him, too? He was not sure, but it didn’t matter. He could not look down at himself, he was terrified that he would see a reflection of his face all over his body: maggot-eaten flesh, a demon’s skin.
He had done this to her.
He had called Christine back to him again with his music, his vengeance... The Moonlight Sonata. Erik remembered his decision to play it: a malicious choice, a snake’s venomous kiss. He had done it as payback for Christine’s abandonment: dark, unbearable music to haunt her mind and erode her calm, masquerading as a popular piece, seemingly innocuous. He’d had a vicious urge to prove to Christine that she was not free of him. It had seemed nothing more than a moment’s rage; he had believed it was over, had never imagined ... this.
I told you to leave, he remembered saying – and Christine’s terrible smile: But first, you locked the door.
This was worse, infinitely worse, than awakening in Sedan to piles of mutilated, destroyed sketches. Erik bent down painfully to pick up Christine’s clothes, his clothes. Every movement required the utmost concentration, and for the minutes it took to clear the floor, he felt almost sane, in control. He dragged himself over to the washstand and managed to clean up a little, then found a fresh shirt, undergarments. Fumbling with urgency, he pulled all these on, trousers, suspenders, the rest of it. The thought that Christine could wake up any instant and see him spurred him on; yet Erik could already feel new layers of perspiration dampening the clean fabric. His memory surged with the image of Christine on top of him, brighter than any light, of his own hands slamming her slender hips down...
Erik grabbed at the window-frame, holding on to the splintery wood, and stuck his head outside. Cold air swept his face, but the horror throbbed within him, unabated. He had finally done it; robbed Christine of her will and imprisoned her again. Locked the door. Mindlessly, Erik noted that dawn was starting; against the lightening sky, roofs and chimneys across the street zigzagged like rotting, pointed teeth.
The world had treated him as a monster, but Christine had never treated him as anything but a man... And he was a man. A man who could not be content with the miracles he had been given, who had to take everything, destroy the one beautiful thing that had breathed joy into his life. Christine had come to him last night because of the music; and savagely, he took the desperation she offered, with his entire body crying out her name, as though it was love.
Erik looked back to the bed. Christine lay still, curled up in his shirt with the blanket around her waist. Her pose was defensive somehow, hurt. She was so thin; his shirt seemed enormous compared with her small hands, and Erik felt shame rise inside him like tears. She was more beautiful than he had ever seen her, more than everything, everything he had ever wanted. And he had no right to this stolen joy. He had to let her go.
"Christine..." he said softly, into the air. It was shameful, he knew, but he could not restrain himself from this last caress, from bringing her awake with his voice. She stirred a little and stretched, sleepy and heart-stoppingly beautiful. "Christine..." he said again.
She sat up, and Erik found himself mute. Her dark, luminous eyes found him in the dawn-light and held him there, helpless. He saw the exact moment when understanding returned: Christine’s eyelashes flicked and her pupils went wide; she grabbed the blanket to her chest, then remembered the rest and her grip loosened, as if she had to tell herself not to hide from his gaze anymore.
The silence fell between them.
"It is morning," said Erik finally.
Christine looked him over. "You’re dressed..."
Erik winced; of course she felt exposed opposite him, with nothing but his shirt and a blanket. "Forgive me," he said. "I did not mean to embarrass you."
He started to turn away to give her a chance to get dressed – and in that instant, discovered that had not put on the bandage. For the first time in his entire life, he had completely forgotten his mask.
Unable to reach for it while Christine was dressing, Erik looked around the bare wall, out the window, anywhere but at Christine, feeling cold and naked, as exposed as she. He heard her moving around uncertainly, trying to collect her clothes. Then water splashed; she had found the washstand. Using the moment, Erik seized the bunched linen off the table and arranged the padding around his eye, wrapping the rest over his head with quick, accustomed motions. Its touch on his skin seemed to calm him somehow, making him more rational. He slowed, taking care to fix the knot tightly in the way he had done for many months.
By the time he had finished, he could turn and meet Christine’s eyes. She had dusted off her dress as best she could, but there was no hiding the reddened skin where her mouth and cheek had been marred by his kisses. He saw her fingers tugging at a button that hung by a thread. Three more buttons were missing.
"It’s all right," she said in reply to his silent inspection. "It’s not important. Just a dress." Yet her fingers continued toying with the button, rolling it around. Erik wanted to stop her hands and move them away, but he was afraid that he would not be able to let go, that he would hold her hands and press kisses to her knuckles and then he would fall apart.
Christine lowered her eyes to the tabletop, where the previous night’s unfinished sketches were still spread. "Are these for your work?"
Erik hesitated. "Yes," he admitted. "An apartment building near the Gare Saint-Lazare."
"May I see?"
He moved his arm aside. "If it interests you."
She stepped up to the table, making him draw an involuntary breath. Erik tried to keep his self-control. "There is nothing of note here, I assure you. I am only redesigning part of the plan to allow for better lighting."
"All right. I won’t judge it harshly." Christine spoke lightly, but Erik could see what it cost her by the tension in her hands as she held them above the drawing, not daring to touch it. She looked up:
"Do you enjoy it?"
Her face was serious and achingly beautiful in the weak light from the window, and on it, the scarlet marks left by his stubble and his coarse fingers were vivid as blood. White skin, so easily bruised.
He had done this.
Erik felt himself recede behind the mask, into the deeper ugliness of his mind. Christine had told him, I want to see you, as you are. That was what he had to show her then. Himself, as he was.
"There is the occasional interesting project," he replied, "certainly. Did you know, for instance, that the de Chagny family were building a house in Saint-Cloud?"
Erik saw the shock strike Christine’s face, and then the spreading blush, merging with the red marks. He had reminded her of Raoul.
"Erik, why are you telling me this?"
"Because my firm has the commission to build that house. I found this out the day I began work. Can you imagine the effect this extraordinary discovery had on me?"
She was silent; clever girl. Erik felt stronger.
"I was furious, Christine. I do not mean that I was angry; I was quite beyond that. Call it madness. I assumed that the house was yours and that the situation was quite deliberately arranged by the one to whom I owed my presence in that office in the first place."
"Madame Giry?.."
Erik nodded slowly. He looked straight into Christine’s eyes, her beautiful, disbelieving eyes, and said, "You remember that night on the balcony? You saw the rope."
She did not move.
"The latch on the balcony door. Was it not broken that night?"
She believed him. He saw it in her whole aspect, in the way she unconsciously drew back, appalled. Yet her voice was steady: "That isn’t true. You said you were not there to harm us."
"You, Christine. I would not have harmed you."
A sickly pallor replaced the heat in her face, as if he had stolen her breath and she was turning into wax, into the statue in his lair. Erik leaned forward and sealed his numb, unmoving lips to her cold forehead.
"You want me to go," Christine whispered, barely audible.
Erik moved his lips to her hair. He could not kiss her. "Go."
She turned for the door, wrenching it open with a strength Erik could not have imagined, and flew down the stairs. The door swung on its hinges, a long squeeeeeeeak, and thudded shut.
Erik sat down slowly at his table and picked up a pencil. He looked it dumbly. A foreign object. What was he doing here? In this room, in this life? Morning had dawned grey and empty, the night was long gone...
Christine’s muffled footsteps flitted over the stairs – then there was a sudden confusion of noise.
A split second later Erik’s door flew open, crashing violently into the wall, so that the whole house gave a shudder. Louise Gandon barged into the room, heading straight for him, dragging Christine in by the wrist.
"What the hell do you mean by this?!" She shoved Christine at Erik.
Erik’s heart dropped as Christine made a sharp cry of pain.
"Salaud! Will you sit there like a turd in a chamber-pot or will you explain what this chit is doing here?" Louise stabbed a finger at Christine’s dress: "This is how you like them, is it?! Young and pretty in fine clothes?"
Her face had gone a terrible shade of purple. "Sale cochon!" she hissed. "You filthy swine, any lackwit can see she’s not even a whore! No whore would stand for this, turned out half-dressed into the street! No, only a brainless little bourgeois twit—"
Erik threw himself at the woman, grasping her shoulders. He bared his teeth at her, all animal in this one moment, conscious of nothing but Christine’s whimper in Louise’s vice-like grip.
"Release her," he managed between his teeth. "Release her, or I swear, they will not find enough of you to bury."
Louise struggled against his hold, but Erik gripped her brutally; digging into the flesh of her shoulders until moisture beaded on her broad forehead. She had not expected such strength from him, he could smell her fear. He wanted her dead, he would kill her, kill the meddling hag.
"Erik, stop."
Christine’s quiet voice startled him, a single note of sanity. Erik realised Louise was no longer holding Christine; Christine had stepped away. He sucked in a breath, and threw Louise backwards, away from him.
She lurched, but did not lose her balance. Tears of pain stood out in her eyes, but she only turned to Christine and jerked her chin in the direction of the bed. "What does your maman say of this, mam’zelle?"
"My mother is dead, madame."
Louise blinked, then gave a mournful toss of her kerchiefed head. "How old are you, girl? Sixteen?"
"Seventeen," Christine said in a stronger voice than Erik had expected. "I thank you for your concern," she went on, "but I am all right."
"Middle-class respectability, my arse... Ruddy Empire." Striding over to the bed, Louise ripped the blanket away.
Erik saw the specks of blood at the same time as she did.
Christine made a pitiful little sound, and Erik could not look at her. He wished she had not stopped him killing Louise.
"Merde..." the woman swore wearily.
Erik reached for the door. "Leave us," he demanded.
Louise glanced at him in profound disgust, and Erik abruptly identified the burning in his chest as shame. For the first time, he wondered exactly how he had expected Christine to get back home, or – his gut squeezed uncomfortably – whether she had been missed this night, or... There were too many ‘or’s, and none of them were pleasant.
"I’ll get a cab," he told Christine, quietly. She nodded, and he reached for his hat, moving slowly, as through water.
"Come along, Mademoiselle Skin-and-Bones," Louise directed eventually. "We’ll get that dress fixed up. I’m Louise Gandon, your so-called gentleman’s landlady."
Christine managed a curtsey. "Christine Daaй, madame."
Erik snapped the hat on his head and fled the room. A cab, he had to find a cab. He was a shaking, rattling mess of nerves but he knew he had to do this thing now, for Christine. He could not think of anything else, not yet.
Near rue Lepic he finally found a hansom and had to restrain himself from hauling the driver back physically, or knocking the old fool off his box and driving the damn thing himself. He had left Christine alone in the company of a woman who had dragged her by the wrist and humiliated her after all his abuses, who thought nothing of violence, who knew him for a murderer and didn’t care – a woman who, Erik recalled with a start, had spoken of a revolution only the previous morning. What if she hurt Christine?
Getting back to the store seemed to take forever; and Erik was convinced that Christine was surely dead and it was his fault, when at last she came outside. Louise shepherded her out, telling her something and shaking a fat finger in her face, and then went back inside. Christine looked unharmed. In fact, she was a great deal calmer, and her clothes seemed in better shape.
Erik opened the door of the cab for her, forgetting all about Louise and everything that had happened when Christine put her gloved hand in his. She was so strong, he thought, this strange morning. How could she bring herself to touch him?
"Erik," Christine muttered, and he realised he was still holding her hand when she was inside and seated. He looked up at her, not knowing how to let go.
Her hand slipped out of his. "I saw the ring. It was there on your shelf, when you were showing me the sketches..."
"I’ll get rid of it," Erik promised, but Christine shook her head:
"Keep it. Please keep it."
Then the snap of a whip got the horse moving and the cab rolled away, taking Christine with it. Long after it was gone, Erik could still hear the carriage-springs squeaking. He waited until that, too, was gone.
Then he went back inside the store, found Louise, and told her very calmly: "I am leaving Paris."
Chapter 22 – As You Are
The first thing Erik knew was an extraordinary warmth permeating his entire body, and a dim, infinite sense of peace. He drifted down through the last few moments of near-sleep, drinking in this unexpected gift as greedily as a freakish child whose cage had been left out in the sun. continue reading >>It was always half-dark behind the burlap mask of the sack, but on an early morning like this one, the sun could slant past the bars of his cage and pierce through the slits in the sack. He would shut his eyes against it, and then the light would become gentler, spreading in a languid glow over his demon-face, stroking him with a lover’s tender hands. Yet it was not just his face that was turned to the sun now. Erik felt its warm caress on his chest, on his thighs...
His heart lurched, and his eyes flew open.
Christine.
Like a sleepwalker at a cliff-edge, Erik realised he woke up a moment from mortal peril. There was no sun; the room was still dark with the bluish shadows of pre-dawn.
The warmth he felt came from Christine.
Her tiny delicate body was curled against him, a cascade of dark curls tumbling forward over her face. Erik was suddenly, disturbingly conscious of each ridge of her spine where it met his chest through the fabric of his shirt, of the proximity of the sweat-damp little hairs on her neck, caught under the collar. His own shirt on Christine’s... He fought for a breath.
Memory came as an explosion of white, an unbelievable confusion of sensations he could not untangle one from another, did not want to. For one delirious moment he believed it, and wondered whether he could have possibly pleased her, and then whether she had been hurt by his clumsy demands; he felt newly made, a paradox: at once anxious and triumphant. Above all of that was the simple, incredible truth. Christine, his Christine had come back to him – she loved him!...
Then the moment was over, and he remembered.
A sick terror strangled the peace Erik had felt, turning his own skin into a cold shell. He could move again; he rolled back. Icy sweat doused him where Christine’s soft, warm body had been.
He had brought her here. Brought her to this.
He staggered to the floor, away from the bed. His lingering desire was a monstrous thing he could not control. God, he was naked... Christine – her hands – he had wanted her to touch – he had dragged up here, screaming, exactly as in his nightmares – she had told him she could not leave – she’d kissed his awful face, and then – oh God. The world swayed and Erik nearly fell, only catching himself at the last moment on the top of the chair. His heel slipped on a piece of clothing; he lifted his foot: Christine’s dress.
Erik stood and stared down at it, his chest heaving. There were black smudges of dust all over her skirts, from when she had scrambled away from him down in the store-room. A couple of buttons were missing; was that him, too? He was not sure, but it didn’t matter. He could not look down at himself, he was terrified that he would see a reflection of his face all over his body: maggot-eaten flesh, a demon’s skin.
He had done this to her.
He had called Christine back to him again with his music, his vengeance... The Moonlight Sonata. Erik remembered his decision to play it: a malicious choice, a snake’s venomous kiss. He had done it as payback for Christine’s abandonment: dark, unbearable music to haunt her mind and erode her calm, masquerading as a popular piece, seemingly innocuous. He’d had a vicious urge to prove to Christine that she was not free of him. It had seemed nothing more than a moment’s rage; he had believed it was over, had never imagined ... this.
I told you to leave, he remembered saying – and Christine’s terrible smile: But first, you locked the door.
This was worse, infinitely worse, than awakening in Sedan to piles of mutilated, destroyed sketches. Erik bent down painfully to pick up Christine’s clothes, his clothes. Every movement required the utmost concentration, and for the minutes it took to clear the floor, he felt almost sane, in control. He dragged himself over to the washstand and managed to clean up a little, then found a fresh shirt, undergarments. Fumbling with urgency, he pulled all these on, trousers, suspenders, the rest of it. The thought that Christine could wake up any instant and see him spurred him on; yet Erik could already feel new layers of perspiration dampening the clean fabric. His memory surged with the image of Christine on top of him, brighter than any light, of his own hands slamming her slender hips down...
Erik grabbed at the window-frame, holding on to the splintery wood, and stuck his head outside. Cold air swept his face, but the horror throbbed within him, unabated. He had finally done it; robbed Christine of her will and imprisoned her again. Locked the door. Mindlessly, Erik noted that dawn was starting; against the lightening sky, roofs and chimneys across the street zigzagged like rotting, pointed teeth.
The world had treated him as a monster, but Christine had never treated him as anything but a man... And he was a man. A man who could not be content with the miracles he had been given, who had to take everything, destroy the one beautiful thing that had breathed joy into his life. Christine had come to him last night because of the music; and savagely, he took the desperation she offered, with his entire body crying out her name, as though it was love.
Erik looked back to the bed. Christine lay still, curled up in his shirt with the blanket around her waist. Her pose was defensive somehow, hurt. She was so thin; his shirt seemed enormous compared with her small hands, and Erik felt shame rise inside him like tears. She was more beautiful than he had ever seen her, more than everything, everything he had ever wanted. And he had no right to this stolen joy. He had to let her go.
"Christine..." he said softly, into the air. It was shameful, he knew, but he could not restrain himself from this last caress, from bringing her awake with his voice. She stirred a little and stretched, sleepy and heart-stoppingly beautiful. "Christine..." he said again.
She sat up, and Erik found himself mute. Her dark, luminous eyes found him in the dawn-light and held him there, helpless. He saw the exact moment when understanding returned: Christine’s eyelashes flicked and her pupils went wide; she grabbed the blanket to her chest, then remembered the rest and her grip loosened, as if she had to tell herself not to hide from his gaze anymore.
The silence fell between them.
"It is morning," said Erik finally.
Christine looked him over. "You’re dressed..."
Erik winced; of course she felt exposed opposite him, with nothing but his shirt and a blanket. "Forgive me," he said. "I did not mean to embarrass you."
He started to turn away to give her a chance to get dressed – and in that instant, discovered that had not put on the bandage. For the first time in his entire life, he had completely forgotten his mask.
Unable to reach for it while Christine was dressing, Erik looked around the bare wall, out the window, anywhere but at Christine, feeling cold and naked, as exposed as she. He heard her moving around uncertainly, trying to collect her clothes. Then water splashed; she had found the washstand. Using the moment, Erik seized the bunched linen off the table and arranged the padding around his eye, wrapping the rest over his head with quick, accustomed motions. Its touch on his skin seemed to calm him somehow, making him more rational. He slowed, taking care to fix the knot tightly in the way he had done for many months.
By the time he had finished, he could turn and meet Christine’s eyes. She had dusted off her dress as best she could, but there was no hiding the reddened skin where her mouth and cheek had been marred by his kisses. He saw her fingers tugging at a button that hung by a thread. Three more buttons were missing.
"It’s all right," she said in reply to his silent inspection. "It’s not important. Just a dress." Yet her fingers continued toying with the button, rolling it around. Erik wanted to stop her hands and move them away, but he was afraid that he would not be able to let go, that he would hold her hands and press kisses to her knuckles and then he would fall apart.
Christine lowered her eyes to the tabletop, where the previous night’s unfinished sketches were still spread. "Are these for your work?"
Erik hesitated. "Yes," he admitted. "An apartment building near the Gare Saint-Lazare."
"May I see?"
He moved his arm aside. "If it interests you."
She stepped up to the table, making him draw an involuntary breath. Erik tried to keep his self-control. "There is nothing of note here, I assure you. I am only redesigning part of the plan to allow for better lighting."
"All right. I won’t judge it harshly." Christine spoke lightly, but Erik could see what it cost her by the tension in her hands as she held them above the drawing, not daring to touch it. She looked up:
"Do you enjoy it?"
Her face was serious and achingly beautiful in the weak light from the window, and on it, the scarlet marks left by his stubble and his coarse fingers were vivid as blood. White skin, so easily bruised.
He had done this.
Erik felt himself recede behind the mask, into the deeper ugliness of his mind. Christine had told him, I want to see you, as you are. That was what he had to show her then. Himself, as he was.
"There is the occasional interesting project," he replied, "certainly. Did you know, for instance, that the de Chagny family were building a house in Saint-Cloud?"
Erik saw the shock strike Christine’s face, and then the spreading blush, merging with the red marks. He had reminded her of Raoul.
"Erik, why are you telling me this?"
"Because my firm has the commission to build that house. I found this out the day I began work. Can you imagine the effect this extraordinary discovery had on me?"
She was silent; clever girl. Erik felt stronger.
"I was furious, Christine. I do not mean that I was angry; I was quite beyond that. Call it madness. I assumed that the house was yours and that the situation was quite deliberately arranged by the one to whom I owed my presence in that office in the first place."
"Madame Giry?.."
Erik nodded slowly. He looked straight into Christine’s eyes, her beautiful, disbelieving eyes, and said, "You remember that night on the balcony? You saw the rope."
She did not move.
"The latch on the balcony door. Was it not broken that night?"
She believed him. He saw it in her whole aspect, in the way she unconsciously drew back, appalled. Yet her voice was steady: "That isn’t true. You said you were not there to harm us."
"You, Christine. I would not have harmed you."
A sickly pallor replaced the heat in her face, as if he had stolen her breath and she was turning into wax, into the statue in his lair. Erik leaned forward and sealed his numb, unmoving lips to her cold forehead.
"You want me to go," Christine whispered, barely audible.
Erik moved his lips to her hair. He could not kiss her. "Go."
She turned for the door, wrenching it open with a strength Erik could not have imagined, and flew down the stairs. The door swung on its hinges, a long squeeeeeeeak, and thudded shut.
Erik sat down slowly at his table and picked up a pencil. He looked it dumbly. A foreign object. What was he doing here? In this room, in this life? Morning had dawned grey and empty, the night was long gone...
Christine’s muffled footsteps flitted over the stairs – then there was a sudden confusion of noise.
A split second later Erik’s door flew open, crashing violently into the wall, so that the whole house gave a shudder. Louise Gandon barged into the room, heading straight for him, dragging Christine in by the wrist.
"What the hell do you mean by this?!" She shoved Christine at Erik.
Erik’s heart dropped as Christine made a sharp cry of pain.
"Salaud! Will you sit there like a turd in a chamber-pot or will you explain what this chit is doing here?" Louise stabbed a finger at Christine’s dress: "This is how you like them, is it?! Young and pretty in fine clothes?"
Her face had gone a terrible shade of purple. "Sale cochon!" she hissed. "You filthy swine, any lackwit can see she’s not even a whore! No whore would stand for this, turned out half-dressed into the street! No, only a brainless little bourgeois twit—"
Erik threw himself at the woman, grasping her shoulders. He bared his teeth at her, all animal in this one moment, conscious of nothing but Christine’s whimper in Louise’s vice-like grip.
"Release her," he managed between his teeth. "Release her, or I swear, they will not find enough of you to bury."
Louise struggled against his hold, but Erik gripped her brutally; digging into the flesh of her shoulders until moisture beaded on her broad forehead. She had not expected such strength from him, he could smell her fear. He wanted her dead, he would kill her, kill the meddling hag.
"Erik, stop."
Christine’s quiet voice startled him, a single note of sanity. Erik realised Louise was no longer holding Christine; Christine had stepped away. He sucked in a breath, and threw Louise backwards, away from him.
She lurched, but did not lose her balance. Tears of pain stood out in her eyes, but she only turned to Christine and jerked her chin in the direction of the bed. "What does your maman say of this, mam’zelle?"
"My mother is dead, madame."
Louise blinked, then gave a mournful toss of her kerchiefed head. "How old are you, girl? Sixteen?"
"Seventeen," Christine said in a stronger voice than Erik had expected. "I thank you for your concern," she went on, "but I am all right."
"Middle-class respectability, my arse... Ruddy Empire." Striding over to the bed, Louise ripped the blanket away.
Erik saw the specks of blood at the same time as she did.
Christine made a pitiful little sound, and Erik could not look at her. He wished she had not stopped him killing Louise.
"Merde..." the woman swore wearily.
Erik reached for the door. "Leave us," he demanded.
Louise glanced at him in profound disgust, and Erik abruptly identified the burning in his chest as shame. For the first time, he wondered exactly how he had expected Christine to get back home, or – his gut squeezed uncomfortably – whether she had been missed this night, or... There were too many ‘or’s, and none of them were pleasant.
"I’ll get a cab," he told Christine, quietly. She nodded, and he reached for his hat, moving slowly, as through water.
"Come along, Mademoiselle Skin-and-Bones," Louise directed eventually. "We’ll get that dress fixed up. I’m Louise Gandon, your so-called gentleman’s landlady."
Christine managed a curtsey. "Christine Daaй, madame."
Erik snapped the hat on his head and fled the room. A cab, he had to find a cab. He was a shaking, rattling mess of nerves but he knew he had to do this thing now, for Christine. He could not think of anything else, not yet.
Near rue Lepic he finally found a hansom and had to restrain himself from hauling the driver back physically, or knocking the old fool off his box and driving the damn thing himself. He had left Christine alone in the company of a woman who had dragged her by the wrist and humiliated her after all his abuses, who thought nothing of violence, who knew him for a murderer and didn’t care – a woman who, Erik recalled with a start, had spoken of a revolution only the previous morning. What if she hurt Christine?
Getting back to the store seemed to take forever; and Erik was convinced that Christine was surely dead and it was his fault, when at last she came outside. Louise shepherded her out, telling her something and shaking a fat finger in her face, and then went back inside. Christine looked unharmed. In fact, she was a great deal calmer, and her clothes seemed in better shape.
Erik opened the door of the cab for her, forgetting all about Louise and everything that had happened when Christine put her gloved hand in his. She was so strong, he thought, this strange morning. How could she bring herself to touch him?
"Erik," Christine muttered, and he realised he was still holding her hand when she was inside and seated. He looked up at her, not knowing how to let go.
Her hand slipped out of his. "I saw the ring. It was there on your shelf, when you were showing me the sketches..."
"I’ll get rid of it," Erik promised, but Christine shook her head:
"Keep it. Please keep it."
Then the snap of a whip got the horse moving and the cab rolled away, taking Christine with it. Long after it was gone, Erik could still hear the carriage-springs squeaking. He waited until that, too, was gone.
Then he went back inside the store, found Louise, and told her very calmly: "I am leaving Paris."
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06.09.2005 в 16:15BTW, a very emotionally draining chapter. Everyone is shaken, and so is the reader.)) But can Erik really believe that he can still influence Chrisitne that way, i mean, can't he see that it was her free choice? (or was it?)))
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06.09.2005 в 16:47But can Erik really believe that he can still influence Christine that way
Why not? She came to him, didn't she?
i mean, can't he see that it was her free choice? (or was it?)))
I don't think it was, entirely. She did explicitly tell him that she was there because she couldn't help it ('I can't leave!'). And I think they both realise even on the previous night, that it's a profoundly insane thing to do. It's wrong on every level, from the pragmatic to the personal.
So, I think it makes sense that Erik searches for an explanation. Does she love him? Pffft, as if.
As for Christine -- I was trying, in the previous chapter, to convey the sense that the last of her resistance has snapped and she's not acting entirely sensibly. Although she was affected by the music (so Erik isn't completely off-base) what really draws her to him is Erik himself.
But... I'm not sure I'd call it love (yet). It's more like -- they've been messing around with each other's brains for so long that they created a connection, and the harder they try to get away, the stronger it becomes.
Tango
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06.09.2005 в 17:02-
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06.09.2005 в 17:19Hmm, desire + lack of self-control = love?
Anyway, of course it's love, otherwise where's the romance.
Tango
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06.09.2005 в 17:26- no, no, you're right, I wouldn't. Infact, if I were her I would have already ended up in some nice clean establishment where they tie your arms when you get too agitated.
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06.09.2005 в 17:36You and me both.
Tango
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06.09.2005 в 18:04-
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07.09.2005 в 04:33