High City on a Hill (ch9)

[igenlode]

I sat down to try to write my long-overdue reviews on my fellow-competitors' stories for the Writers Anonymous challenge, having eventually succeeded in downloading them via the library for offline reading despite the worst that FFnet could do, but completely failed to do so -- however I have, instead, finally managed to finish typing up and checking the next chapter of Hertha back against the manuscript. And I have also -- as of September 2^nd -- managed to complete the rewrite on Chapter 24 of Arctic Raoul (after three months of delay) and even got as far as typing up the first scene of Ch25, although I still have another two scenes comprising a total of 3,500 words or so to be typed. (Those chapters are definitely getting longer and longer, and it massively inflates the editing time because the prospect becomes so daunting...)

---

(In random POTO news, I've just heard that the apparently-indefinite run of the New York "Phantom of the Opera" production on Broadway is due to end after the next block of tickets has been issued, due to the fact that Covid-19 has killed the tourist trade there: apparently it's currently losing a million dollars a week, although the announcement will presumably bring a temporary boost in 'last chance to see' ticket sales. Maybe Lloyd Webber's unpopular decision to save money by slashing the size of the orchestra from the original West End production was a life-saving measure after all.)

---

Chapter 9 — “Well-Beloved Wife”

As I’d anticipated, Raoul returned to follow me out almost before the carriage had been brought round. He looked tired and rather dispirited despite the splendour of his costume, and was disinclined to talk even once we were seated and driving back.

Madame Giry had been less than helpful, I gathered. She’d disclosed what she’d heard or guessed about the Ghost’s origins — a carnival freak and deformed genius who’d gone missing years before, evidently quitting the sideshow life to take up existence outside the law — but she’d said nothing of how she came to be delivering his notes, or of where he could be found, and Raoul was convinced she had to know more than she was telling.

“You know, carnival origins could explain quite a lot.” Despite myself, I found my interest caught. “Not least the use of mesmerism. And the oddly theatrical flair — this isn’t just lunacy, it’s an insane performance.”

“Yes.” Raoul sounded less than enthused, his mind clearly occupied elsewhere. He swallowed, and drew a breath. “Hertha—”

But at that moment the carriage checked and swung in off the street to the lighted courtyard of the Hôtel Chagny, servants running out to lower the steps and take the horses’ heads, and whatever he had meant to say, the moment for it was gone. I was swept away upstairs to be soothed and disrobed and have a bowl of water brought for my aching feet, and presently, when the immediate discomfort had been eased, allowed myself to be inserted between sheets warmed against the last of the springtime chill.

As Vicomtesse de Chagny, I would never be lacking in any material comfort. I’d always known that, I told myself, lying awake in the lonely embrace of the feather bed. It was what my father had wanted for me with this marriage.

But he’d also wanted me to marry a young man of my own age, with whom I could share a liking, and in time something more. Raoul and I had been so close... but I was not part of his dream, I never had been, and back then I had never guessed how much that could hurt.

I passed a restless night, and rose late and heavy-eyed. The household was buzzing with gossip about the masquerade, and I could not seem to settle to anything. None of the books on the shelf held any interest, nor the sachet I was stitching as a gift for the old Vicomtesse. There were half a dozen letters I needed to write, but somehow I could not bring myself to take up my pen. I was turning a pile of envelopes over and over, as if in search of inspiration, when the second post was brought up.

In amongst the usual bills and correspondence, there was a note in my father’s flowing hand. It was written in the old familiar dialect of childhood, and it was the same news as always, borne cheerfully and without a breath of self-pity or regret. It is so very hard for her, he wrote. But we must have patience, and believe that once more this will pass.

Poor Mama. Looking down at the single sheet that breathed such love, I could feel my eyes blur with tears. She was worth twenty of those women at last night’s ball, with their fine titles and arrogance of race. And we had been so happy together at Christmas that I had begun to let myself hope that perhaps, with the prospect of the grandchild to come, she might have broken free of the old darkness at last.

Well, that had been too much to hope for. Along with everything else. I put my head down on the desk, unable to bear it any more.

Mama was locked in again behind drawn curtains, huddled in her dressing-gown as so often before, haunted forever by lost Rudi and memories of what could not be. And I... I was trapped here in a cage of luxury and concern with the knowledge of a world that did not want us, and a husband I could not reach.

When Raoul’s knock on the door came, hesitant, I sat up in feverish haste and tried to dry my eyes. “Well?”

My voice was not quite steady. I did not care.

If Raoul noticed, he said nothing. He came in with the air of a schoolboy summoned to his headmaster’s office, and faced me, reluctant but clearly resolved. “You said ‘later’. And last night... there was no time.”

“Yes.” I abandoned all artifice suddenly, drained by exhaustion and the weight of the child within me. “We need to talk. We need to talk about Christine, because this can’t go on — I can’t go on. My mother’s ill, and my father needs me... and you don’t need me, Raoul. It’s very clear that I’m just in the way.”

Whatever he’d expected, it was not this. For a moment his face was blind, appalled. “No — that’s not—”

“You don’t have to worry. I won’t make a scandal, or a fuss. I can just go back to my father’s house for a couple of months, and you and Christine can have one another to your hearts’ content — let the whole thing burn itself out and be done with it, instead of this anguished dance of honour.” I caught back a sob. “Oh, I know you’ve done nothing, either of you. You haven’t even let yourselves think of it. I was not to know, and not to be hurt. Only that hasn’t worked, has it? This thing is burning us up, all of us. You can’t protect me from it, or shield Christine’s reputation. It’s too late for that.”

Somehow I was still waiting for the denial. But there was none. We’d never lied to each other, he and I.

I thrust back my chair; found my way to my feet, despite the trembling that had overtaken me.

“Your child will be delivered here, in this house, as a true-born Chagny. I promise you that. But before then, we need to face the truth. And the truth is that as things are, there’s no place for me in your life any more. You’re eating your heart out for her. You’ve ruined her already, you and the Ghost between you; no-one will believe in her virtue now, nobody cares. Do the decent thing. Give her at least some hole-in-the-corner happiness instead of this endless pretence. I’ll remove myself, and you can get it over with. That’s what you want, isn’t it? Isn’t it?”

I could hear the rising edge of hysteria. Couldn’t choke it down or stop the shivers that were racking me apart. Couldn’t cry out that I didn’t mean it, Raoul, oh, Raoul, I didn’t mean it....

His hands caught me, and held me tightly.

“Hertha, listen to me. Hertha. Hertha!” Each word a tiny shake, as if to rouse a sleepwalker. “I would never... do that to Christine, and you know it. Not because I don’t care for her, I won’t pretend that, but because I do. And I would never —never!— send you out of my house. You are my beloved wife, and you have to believe that.”

“Your wife, yes!” I flung the word back at him. “Welcomed and familiar, like a well-worn pair of boots, like a beloved book, or horse, or hound... but that isn’t the same, is it?”

“Maybe so,” Raoul said quietly, his voice as calm and desolate as I had ever heard it. “But still you are my wife, and that is not a small matter, or one that I would set aside. This... this thing will pass. It has to pass.”

Only I could not tell if it was me he was so adamant to convince, or himself.

“You heard what was said of us last night.” I tried to keep my own voice level, with an effort. “What was said of me. What they will all be saying even now, behind closed doors, or openly with a snigger... what they have been whispering of my family since first we came to Paris. However often I go to Mass, no-one will forget that my ancestors were Hebrews — that my grandfather became a Baron by lending money at the Emperor’s court!”

I carried the proud blood of Jerusalem, and I was not ashamed of it. In Vienna, it had not seemed to matter so much. But I knew —I’d always known— what people thought of us. I’d been conscious of their eyes all my life, guessing, judging. Once a Jew, always a Jew.

Raoul knew — of course he knew. Everyone knew. But never for one moment, even when we were younger, had he let slip the polite mask of pretence that we all maintained. Some subjects were simply not to be discussed.

Now I’d done the unacceptable and flung it in both our faces. Shudders racked me still, but I was too tired to care. Raoul’s arms around me were the refuge I desperately needed but dared not let myself trust. I pulled away, and almost fell.

“Here, sit down.” Raoul caught my elbow and got me into the comfort of the high-backed chair that stood by the window. Somewhere outside there was sunlight and the din of the street, and a dog barking on and on in monotonous protest.

Silhouetted against the panes, Raoul had the look of one who was desperately at a loss. “Shall I get you a—”

“A glass of water?” Even now, I found, without meaning it he could make me laugh. “No — no, thank you.”

It wasn’t as if I’d ever got to drink the last glass of water he’d tried to fetch for me. Memories of yesterday welled up again and I bit my lip, trying to hold back the tears amid the ridiculous trembling that would not stop.

“All right.” Raoul sighed and ran a hand through his hair, leaning back against the window frame. A few seconds of silence. “You know, maybe your grandfather got his title through services rendered to a grateful monarch... but mine was a complete disgrace to his noble ancestors. So I’d say that makes us about even.”

It was a gallant attempt, and maybe at another time I’d have been able to appreciate his effort to lighten the mood. But I was too tired. “Raoul, it’s not a joking matter.”

“I’m not joking. You can ask my father, if you like — oh, we don’t talk about it, of course, but it’s no secret. It’s just that... well, by all accounts most of the stories weren’t exactly the sort of thing one would repeat in front of a lady.”

Absurdly, he’d flushed up, and I had to grin. “Oh, honestly— “

“Honestly.” He returned the grin, a little shamefaced. “I couldn’t tell you most of them, anyway — I was only a boy, and none of the servants would let me into the details of the really juicy ones. But there was the Battle of Waterloo, for instance. The great battle of all the legends: the English Guards at the blazing ruins of Hougoumont, the cavalry who made charge after charge and were cut to pieces, and ‘la Garde ne recule pas’.”

I’d been taught to give thanks for the overthrow of the monster Buonaparte and shudder at the total of those maimed and dead, but I wasn’t sure Raoul saw it quite that way. “And so your grandfather was there?”

“He was there for the start of the fighting — all resplendent, no doubt, in his breastplate and his sabre and the uniform that had stolen hearts on the ballroom floor. Unfortunately, the gallant and noble Louis-Amadée de Chagny was next seen fleeing the field as fast as his wounded horse would carry him, with the rest of his troop galloping pell-mell in his wake. Even after the peace treaty, it took a long time to live that one down.”

“I can imagine.” Half-disbelieving, half-appalled, I was trying to keep a straight face; but he had captured my attention, and almost without my knowledge the tremors had begun to ease.

“On the bright side, of course,” Raoul said ruefully, “he did survive the battle. Which is just as well from my point of view. And after another six years of scandal, debt, and outraged husbands, he did manage a legitimate heir: my father. Shortly afterwards he proceeded to come to an inglorious end, and the family promptly did its best to pretend he had never existed.”

He shot me a tentative gleam of mischief; sobered. “Now, I never had the honour of meeting the Baron your grandfather. But your father Thaddeus Graupmann is one of the most courteous and cultivated gentlemen of my acquaintance, and if your grandfather was anything like him then he and his ancestors were worth more than all those at the ball last night put together.”

His voice hardened. “Let alone some sideshow mountebank with a taste for threats and blackmail. I’m not going to let the Opera Ghost dictate my actions, or hurt anyone else if I can help it. And I’m not going to let him hurt anyone through me. Even if there were no Christine — if there never had been a Christine—”

Only, for us, there had always been Christine. That was the trouble. I’d always known there was something. I just hadn’t known it was her.

I got up, a little clumsily, and found myself steady on my feet. Allowed Raoul to spring forward in haste from the window embrasure to offer me his arm, more conscious than I should have been of the firm warmth of muscle beneath his sleeve. He wouldn’t let me fall if he could help it, but there were things neither of us could help.

“It’s Christine the Opera Ghost wants.” The words came out colder and harsher than I’d intended. “People will go on getting hurt until she’s removed from the equation — or he’s dealt with. If you want to see her safe, then send her out of Paris again. But if you want to see an end to this once and for all, then keep her in the Opera, in full view, and wait... for him to make a mistake.”

“And use her as bait?” Raoul’s arm stiffened under mine; drew away. “Just how is that going to protect her?”

“By entrapping and disposing of the threat. Women aren’t as fragile as you think, Raoul. We can face our fears and do what we must. And sometimes the only way out of darkness is straight ahead through the worst of the night.”

“And sometimes those who march bravely ahead into blackness are lost,” Raoul shot back. “It’s not death that I’d be asking her to face — it’s the chance of losing herself utterly. Of being devoured. She’s not as strong as you are, and she’s more frightened than you can imagine, frightened that if she falls under his dominion again she’ll never come back. That he will strip from her not only the power but even the desire to return.”

And then, perhaps, it might truly all be over, as if the last six months had never been. That thought slid in from nowhere, with a sudden chill of temptation. With Christine given over body and soul to another man’s jealous possession, Raoul and I could be free of her at last...

This is how the Ghost thinks. It was an ugly thing to know of oneself; uglier yet to hear an echo of the contempt with which he saw me. This is how the Ghost thinks: seeing people as playing-pieces, obstacles to be removed without consequences, and without regret.

It was not only wicked; it was folly. If Christine were to vanish into the Ghost’s clutches tomorrow, ravished away into whatever underworld existence kept him hidden from the law, then the memory of her would haunt our marriage for the rest of our days, frozen into a perfection that reality could never attain. Raoul would not forgive himself. Perhaps he would not forgive me. And I— I would have to live with the knowledge that I had chosen to deliver another woman into the hands of a man of whom she was terrified, not for any harm that she had ever done me, but because her very existence had broken in upon a calm, amicable contentment that I’d once taken for granted.

“Do as you please.” I was not going to argue Opera policy with him or fight a rival’s cause any further. I had command of myself now, and I had not changed my mind. “Only remember, when you’re trying to catch your Ghost, that like it or not the way to him is through Christine Daaé... I mean to pay a call on my father now, if you’ve no objection. I don’t suppose I shall be back for luncheon. Unless Mama is very much better, I shall start packing up my things this evening —a couple of trunks should suffice— and I should be obliged if you’d have them sent round as soon as possible. You know the house; it’s on the Place Clignot-les-Pins, the second-floor apartments. We’ll see each other at supper tonight, I dare say, for it will take a while to have my rooms there put back in order.”

If I knew my father, they were probably stacked high with boxes of papers and interesting specimens at this minute. I smiled inwardly, picturing his dismay; his delight.

“You’re... going?” My husband’s face showed all too clearly that he had not believed it until this moment. No doubt he’d taken it for granted that this was just another whim of a woman with child, to be soothed away by a droll story of a disgraceful ancestor.

“I’m going.” Father’s note was still open on the bureau; I leaned down to pick it up. “Not because I’m ashamed of my family or my people, or afraid, or even angry at what has happened to us. Not for the Ghost, and not for Christine. I’m tired, that’s all. Just— tired, and I want to go home.”

That last word slipped out almost without thought, and I would have called it back in an instant if I could. Raoul made no move, but he had gone very pale.

“I thought—” He swallowed, and tried again. “You don’t have to do this on my account. If anyone has said anything— if my mother—”

“Your mother thinks you’re an idiot for making such a clumsy fuss over the simple matter of taking a mistress, and I’m an idiot for permitting you to make such a mess of it.” There was an odd relief to crudity, when I’d schooled my tongue so carefully for so long. Raoul stared at me; went scarlet, and choked on sudden, shared laughter.

“You know that’s not true. Don’t you?”

“I do know that you’re trying very hard to avoid it,” I said quietly, aching a little for him. A little for myself. “Only the process is... exhausting for the rest of us. And I’d rather be out of it for a while, if you don’t mind.”

“For a while.” Raoul caught at that, with an eagerness that hurt, so that I had to force myself to quench the little flame that leaped up unthinking in response. “Hertha, I’d never keep you from your family if they need you. Go for as long as you want; do what you have to do. Give my regards to your father, and tell him I’ll come to call, if I may — if you think it would be of any help. But... you have a place here, and you always will. I—”

The words tangled and came to a complete halt, and he turned away with a helpless gesture. “I don’t want that sort of freedom, or at that cost. Will you believe that of me, at least? And will you come back when you can — as soon as you can?”

I’d been braced for anger when he realised I meant it. Prepared to face down a husband’s authority and furious demands. I hadn’t steeled myself against the line of his averted profile, and this utter acceptance of defeat.

“Of course I’ll be coming back.” I’d yielded that promise almost before I knew it. “And you shall come to dinner as often as you like, and bring us in the memory of sunlight outside.”

He’d always been good with Mama when we were younger. And Father liked him, I told myself, and would be far happier to see us together than to guess at an estrangement.

Raoul swung back round, his patent relief and gratitude my instant reward... along with a prick of conscience. I was, after all, making him in effect pay the price for crimes he hadn’t even committed.

I went to him quickly and got a finger across his lips before it was too late, with a shake of my head. “Don’t. If you were ever my friend... just don’t.”

It was clear he did not understand; I was not sure I understood myself. But whatever he was going to say, it had no place between us now.

Our eyes met: his questioning, mine held wide on a plea. After a moment he nodded.

“All right.” He’d lifted my hand away to speak; now he kissed it, briefly and punctiliously, before returning it to my possession, every inch the courteous husband. The gesture brought with it a sharp ache beneath the ribs, as if he had stabbed me there. “We’ll see each other tonight, then. I’ll have my mother send up a couple of steady girls to help with the packing. Is there anything else... anything else I can do?”

“You’re doing it.” I managed a smile. Staying calm. Not making a scene. Being the sensible one, for once. It did not make it any easier. All I wanted to do was to run away, but that would solve nothing, in the end. “Just... don’t let the Ghost get away, Raoul. And if there’s any blow I can strike against him, I want to have a part in it. This is my fight too, and last night he himself chose to make it so.”

To the Opera Ghost, I was less than nothing — not even an obstacle. He’d brushed me aside with casual malice, and I did not suppose he’d spared me a second thought.

Such a man used the weapons that lay closest to hand, and the first thing he’d gone for was not my marriage, but the blood that flowed in my veins: blood more ancient and honourable by far than that of any sideshow conjurer. If I was an outsider, so was he. If I was a foreigner, then what of his coveted Christine, born of a Swedish father into the cosmopolitan courts of Europe?

My family were bourgeois; boringly respectable, by comparison to a Louis-Amadée de Chagny or his ilk. And if my grandfather had chosen to change his faith as a matter of convenience, we had never been ashamed to acknowledge friends and contemporaries who had not. I would never be as beautiful as Christine, with the rich highlights in her tumbling dark curls and her little tip-tilted kitten-features, with all their wide-eyed charm. But then I would never be as beautiful as the Queen of Sheba, either — or as my own mother, who had never once let slip a word of disappointment as to my lack of lustre in comparison. All the same, I was no hook-nosed caricature. I was a woman like any other and no plainer than most, and if my fortune had bought me my marriage, then it was through money wisely invested and honestly made.

The Opera Ghost had taunted that I could not hold a husband, and maybe he was right. Maybe by my actions today I was destroying the last vestiges of a life I’d taken for granted. But it was my choice, one of the few that I could make, and it was there because I had not chosen to disown who I was or where I had come from. I would go home to my foreign family, and we would be aliens in Paris together.

Home. I caught myself up on the petulance of that thought. It was my parents’ home, and it would always be open to me — but I was no schoolgirl to run back in tears to my childhood room. My home was where Raoul was, in more senses than one.

The Ghost had taunted me for the state of my marriage, but first and foremost he had mocked my people, scorning the heart of who I was. Perhaps he had forgotten what the world also chose to say of us: that our memories were long, and our resentment ran deep.

“This is my fight too.” I looked back at Raoul; saw the young Vicomte who’d stood by me when I was that shrinking schoolgirl, new to Paris. “Don’t let him get away.”

“I’ve no intention of doing so.” His face had hardened, but there was a grim gladness in it. In this, at least, we could be of one accord. “If the Ghost wants war, he can have it.”