Past the Graveyard
2 December 2021 09:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
igenlodeI'm quite proud of myself in that I managed to sustain my customary snail-like progress on Hertha (most of the time) in addition to writing daily D.K. Broster drabbles. The net result of which is that I have now finished what I think is Chapter Eleven, after what I had assumed was going to be the end scene of a rather short Chapter Ten massively overflowed. So Chapter Ten turns out to be mostly taken up by Hertha's 'new life' back in her parents' house (with Raoul as frequent dinner-guest in order to allay suspicions of a marital breach), followed by her expedition to the dressmaker, and only a couple of pages of Christine bursting out of the Opera Populaire in tears in the middle of her afternoon rehearsal, upon which Hertha is moved to take her up into the carriage and give her a lift to the graveyard (implied to be a considerable journey out of Paris -- I did look up suitable historical vicinities, but decided it was safer to make up my own :-p). Hertha's ostensible motivation to help is therefore her desire to soothe Christine down to ensure that she will perform in the opera, in order that Raoul's plan (which Hertha thinks is a good one, albeit she is possibly biased by the fact that she initially prompted it!) should not fail.
Chapter Eleven is then a summary of a Christine's-eye view (as told to Hertha, and thus doubly filtered through editorial comment) of her distress at 'Notes II" and Raoul's plan, in a world in which Raoul can't decently offer her any moral support at all, followed by Christine going off into the cemetery and failing to come back, followed by Hertha herself getting down and ending up (as back in Chapter Two/Three) being ensnared by the overspill of the Phantom's blandishments so that she ends up also drawn to the Daaé grave. Only she is not the designated target and is able to shake off the influence and confront the Phantom on her own terms: "You know very little of our sex, monsieur, if you think that is the way to win the heart you so much desire!"
Raoul doesn't show up at all. Hertha of course cannot hope to fight the Phantom physically (not least because she is now six months pregnant and in need of maternity clothes), so she manages -- unintentionally -- to discommode him by falling into potential premature labour as a result of his fireballs, which frightens and angers Christine enough for her to defy the Phantom herself. "I owe you nothing any longer. You're not my tutor -- you'll never be my tutor again. And if you try to beguile me even once more, I'll hate you for it as long as we both still live!"
Christine physically rescues Hertha, who is terrified for her baby and can't help blaming Christine for getting her into that situation in the first place. And the implied result, of course, is that Christine now commits whole-heartedly to the entrapment scheme... which I think is pretty much canon. She may be still hankering after the guidance of the Angel of Music at the time of "Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again", but she can scarcely harbour much nostalgia for him in the aftermath, when he has abused her trust to try to lure her with lies, has attacked Raoul, and has declared 'war upon you both' (or, in my version, 'upon you also', since Raoul isn't there ;-p)
Now I just have to reassure Hertha (and the reader) that the premature labour is nothing more than a false alarm, and then I think the next stop is actually going to be "Don Juan". It looks as if we're probably going to have to keep the entire graveyard scene and its aftermath a secret from Raoul, because otherwise there is no way he is going to allow his by-now-seven-months-pregnant wife to attend a performance in which the whole idea is that the Phantom will physically manifest himself, given that he has already actively attacked her and that she has incurred his personal ire. I also question whether Raoul will be sitting in Box Five if he plans to have Hertha with him, given that his reason for doing so is presumably on the assumption that this is the most likely place for the Phantom to appear...
At any rate, the ending is sort of in sight. I still don't know how we're going to do the originally planned finale between Christine and Hertha, in which Christine kisses an unconscious Raoul 'for the first time and the last', given that stage-Raoul doesn't get put through nearly as much hell as movie-Raoul before reaching the Final Lair and has a lot less excuse for collapsing in a picturesque fashion ;-p
But I'm quite pleased with that revamped graveyard scene, where the female-solidarity angle really does affect the outcome of what is a pivotal plot point. And we're definitely back in fan-fiction territory instead of dealing with marital relationships!
Chapter Eleven is then a summary of a Christine's-eye view (as told to Hertha, and thus doubly filtered through editorial comment) of her distress at 'Notes II" and Raoul's plan, in a world in which Raoul can't decently offer her any moral support at all, followed by Christine going off into the cemetery and failing to come back, followed by Hertha herself getting down and ending up (as back in Chapter Two/Three) being ensnared by the overspill of the Phantom's blandishments so that she ends up also drawn to the Daaé grave. Only she is not the designated target and is able to shake off the influence and confront the Phantom on her own terms: "You know very little of our sex, monsieur, if you think that is the way to win the heart you so much desire!"
Raoul doesn't show up at all. Hertha of course cannot hope to fight the Phantom physically (not least because she is now six months pregnant and in need of maternity clothes), so she manages -- unintentionally -- to discommode him by falling into potential premature labour as a result of his fireballs, which frightens and angers Christine enough for her to defy the Phantom herself. "I owe you nothing any longer. You're not my tutor -- you'll never be my tutor again. And if you try to beguile me even once more, I'll hate you for it as long as we both still live!"
Christine physically rescues Hertha, who is terrified for her baby and can't help blaming Christine for getting her into that situation in the first place. And the implied result, of course, is that Christine now commits whole-heartedly to the entrapment scheme... which I think is pretty much canon. She may be still hankering after the guidance of the Angel of Music at the time of "Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again", but she can scarcely harbour much nostalgia for him in the aftermath, when he has abused her trust to try to lure her with lies, has attacked Raoul, and has declared 'war upon you both' (or, in my version, 'upon you also', since Raoul isn't there ;-p)
Now I just have to reassure Hertha (and the reader) that the premature labour is nothing more than a false alarm, and then I think the next stop is actually going to be "Don Juan". It looks as if we're probably going to have to keep the entire graveyard scene and its aftermath a secret from Raoul, because otherwise there is no way he is going to allow his by-now-seven-months-pregnant wife to attend a performance in which the whole idea is that the Phantom will physically manifest himself, given that he has already actively attacked her and that she has incurred his personal ire. I also question whether Raoul will be sitting in Box Five if he plans to have Hertha with him, given that his reason for doing so is presumably on the assumption that this is the most likely place for the Phantom to appear...
At any rate, the ending is sort of in sight. I still don't know how we're going to do the originally planned finale between Christine and Hertha, in which Christine kisses an unconscious Raoul 'for the first time and the last', given that stage-Raoul doesn't get put through nearly as much hell as movie-Raoul before reaching the Final Lair and has a lot less excuse for collapsing in a picturesque fashion ;-p
But I'm quite pleased with that revamped graveyard scene, where the female-solidarity angle really does affect the outcome of what is a pivotal plot point. And we're definitely back in fan-fiction territory instead of dealing with marital relationships!
