Chapter V The Enchanted Violin
Christine Daae, owing to intrigues to which I will return later, didnot immediately continue her triumph at the Opera. After the famousgala night, she sang once at the Duchess de Zurich's; but this was thelast occasion on which she was heard in private. She refused, withoutplausible excuse, to appear at a charity concert to which she hadpromised her assistance. She acted throughout as though she were nolonger the mistress of her own destiny and as though she feared a freshtriumph.
She knew that the Comte de Chagny, to please his brother, had done hisbest on her behalf with M. Richard; and she wrote to thank him and alsoto ask him to cease speaking in her favor. Her reason for this curiousattitude was never known. Some pretended that it was due tooverweening pride; others spoke of her heavenly modesty. But people onthe stage are not so modest as all that; and I think that I shall notbe far from the truth if I ascribe her action simply to fear. Yes, Ibelieve that Christine Daae was frightened by what had happened to her.I have a letter of Christine's (it forms part of the Persian'scollection), relating to this period, which suggests a feeling ofabsolute dismay:
"I don't know myself when I sing," writes the poor child.
She showed herself nowhere; and the Vicomte de Chagny tried in vain tomeet her. He wrote to her, asking to call upon her, but despaired ofreceiving a reply when, one morning, she sent him the following note:
MONSIEUR:
I have not forgotten the little boy who went into the sea to rescue myscarf. I feel that I must write to you to-day, when I am going toPerros, in fulfilment of a sacred duty. To-morrow is the anniversaryof the death of my poor father, whom you knew and who was very fond ofyou. He is buried there, with his violin, in the graveyard of thelittle church, at the bottom of the slope where we used to play aschildren, beside the road where, when we were a little bigger, we saidgood-by for the last time.
The Vicomte de Chagny hurriedly consulted a railway guide, dressed asquickly as he could, wrote a few lines for his valet to take to hisbrother and jumped into a cab which brought him to the GareMontparnasse just in time to miss the morning train. He spent a dismalday in town and did not recover his spirits until the evening, when hewas seated in his compartment in the Brittany express. He readChristine's note over and over again, smelling its perfume, recallingthe sweet pictures of his childhood, and spent the rest of that tediousnight journey in feverish dreams that began and ended with ChristineDaae. Day was breaking when he alighted at Lannion. He hurried to thediligence for Perros-Guirec. He was the only passenger. He questionedthe driver and learned that, on the evening of the previous day, ayoung lady who looked like a Parisian had gone to Perros and put up atthe inn known as the Setting Sun.
The nearer he drew to her, the more fondly he remembered the story ofthe little Swedish singer. Most of the details are still unknown tothe public.
There was once, in a little market-town not far from Upsala, a peasantwho lived there with his family, digging the earth during the week andsinging in the choir on Sundays. This peasant had a little daughter towhom he taught the musical alphabet before she knew how to read.Daae's father was a great musician, perhaps without knowing it. Not afiddler throughout the length and breadth of Scandinavia played as hedid. His reputation was widespread and he was always invited to setthe couples dancing at weddings and other festivals. His wife diedwhen Christine was entering upon her sixth year. Then the father, whocared only for his daughter and his music, sold his patch of ground andwent to Upsala in search of fame and fortune. He found nothing butpoverty.
He returned to the country, wandering from fair to fair, strumming hisScandinavian melodies, while his child, who never left his side,listened to him in ecstasy or sang to his playing. One day, at LjimbyFair, Professor Valerius heard them and took them to Gothenburg. Hemaintained that the father was the first violinist in the world andthat the daughter had the making of a great artist. Her education andinstruction were provided for. She made rapid progress and charmedeverybody with her prettiness, her grace of manner and her genuineeagerness to please.
When Valerius and his wife went to settle in France, they took Daae andChristine with them. "Mamma" Valerius treated Christine as herdaughter. As for Daae, he began to pine away with homesickness. Henever went out of doors in Paris, but lived in a sort of dream which hekept up with his violin. For hours at a time, he remained locked up inhis bedroom with his daughter, fiddling and singing, very, very softly.Sometimes Mamma Valerius would come and listen behind the door, wipeaway a tear and go down-stairs again on tiptoe, sighing for herScandinavian skies.
Daae seemed not to recover his strength until the summer, when thewhole family went to stay at Perros-Guirec, in a far-away corner ofBrittany, where the sea was of the same color as in his own country.Often he would play his saddest tunes on the beach and pretend that thesea stopped its roaring to listen to them. And then he induced MammaValerius to indulge a queer whim of his. At the time of the "pardons,"or Breton pilgrimages, the village festival and dances, he went offwith his fiddle, as in the old days, and was allowed to take hisdaughter with him for a week. They gave the smallest hamlets music tolast them for a year and slept at night in a barn, refusing a bed atthe inn, lying close together on the straw, as when they were so poorin Sweden. At the same time, they were very neatly dressed, made nocollection, refused the halfpence offered them; and the people aroundcould not understand the conduct of this rustic fiddler, who trampedthe roads with that pretty child who sang like an angel from Heaven.They followed them from village to village.
One day, a little boy, who was out with his governess, made her take alonger walk than he intended, for he could not tear himself from thelittle girl whose pure, sweet voice seemed to bind him to her. Theycame to the shore of an inlet which is still called Trestraou, butwhich now, I believe, harbors a casino or something of the sort. Atthat time, there was nothing but sky and sea and a stretch of goldenbeach. Only, there was also a high wind, which blew Christine's scarfout to sea. Christine gave a cry and put out her arms, but the scarfwas already far on the waves. Then she heard a voice say:
"It's all right, I'll go and fetch your scarf out of the sea."
And she saw a little boy running fast, in spite of the outcries and theindignant protests of a worthy lady in black. The little boy ran intothe sea, dressed as he was, and brought her back her scarf. Boy andscarf were both soaked through. The lady in black made a great fuss,but Christine laughed merrily and kissed the little boy, who was noneother than the Vicomte Raoul de Chagny, staying at Lannion with hisaunt.
During the season, they saw each other and played together almost everyday. At the aunt's request, seconded by Professor Valerius, Daaeconsented to give the young viscount some violin lessons. In this way,Raoul learned to love the same airs that had charmed Christine'schildhood. They also both had the same calm and dreamy little cast ofmind. They delighted in stories, in old Breton legends; and theirfavorite sport was to go and ask for them at the cottage-doors, likebeggars:
"Ma'am ..." or, "Kind gentleman ... have you a little story to tell us,please?"
And it seldom happened that they did not have one "given" them; fornearly every old Breton grandame has, at least once in her life, seenthe "korrigans" dance by moonlight on the heather.
But their great treat was, in the twilight, in the great silence of theevening, after the sun had set in the sea, when Daae came and sat downby them on the roadside and, in a low voice, as though fearing lest heshould frighten the ghosts whom he evoked, told them the legends of theland of the North. And, the moment he stopped, the children would askfor more.
There was one story that began:
"A king sat in a little boat on one of those deep, still lakes thatopen like a bright eye in the midst of the Norwegian mountains ..."
And another:
"Little Lotte thought of everything and nothing. Her hair was goldenas the sun's rays and her soul as clear and blue as her eyes. Sh
ewheedled her mother, was kind to her doll, took great care of her frockand her little red shoes and her fiddle, but most of all loved, whenshe went to sleep, to hear the Angel of Music."
While the old man told this story, Raoul looked at Christine's blueeyes and golden hair; and Christine thought that Lotte was very luckyto hear the Angel of Music when she went to sleep. The Angel of Musicplayed a part in all Daddy Daae's tales; and he maintained that everygreat musician, every great artist received a visit from the Angel atleast once in his life. Sometimes the Angel leans over their cradle,as happened to Lotte, and that is how there are little prodigies whoplay the fiddle at six better than men at fifty, which, you must admit,is very wonderful. Sometimes, the Angel comes much later, because thechildren are naughty and won't learn their lessons or practise theirscales. And, sometimes, he does not come at all, because the childrenhave a bad heart or a bad conscience.
No one ever sees the Angel; but he is heard by those who are meant tohear him. He often comes when they least expect him, when they are sadand disheartened. Then their ears suddenly perceive celestialharmonies, a divine voice, which they remember all their lives.Persons who are visited by the Angel quiver with a thrill unknown tothe rest of mankind. And they can not touch an instrument, or opentheir mouths to sing, without producing sounds that put all other humansounds to shame. Then people who do not know that the Angel hasvisited those persons say that they have genius.
Little Christine asked her father if he had heard the Angel of Music.But Daddy Daae shook his head sadly; and then his eyes lit up, as hesaid:
"You will hear him one day, my child! When I am in Heaven, I will sendhim to you!"
Daddy was beginning to cough at that time.
Three years later, Raoul and Christine met again at Perros. ProfessorValerius was dead, but his widow remained in France with Daddy Daae andhis daughter, who continued to play the violin and sing, wrapping intheir dream of harmony their kind patroness, who seemed henceforth tolive on music alone. The young man, as he now was, had come to Perroson the chance of finding them and went straight to the house in whichthey used to stay. He first saw the old man; and then Christineentered, carrying the tea-tray. She flushed at the sight of Raoul, whowent up to her and kissed her. She asked him a few questions,performed her duties as hostess prettily, took up the tray again andleft the room. Then she ran into the garden and took refuge on abench, a prey to feelings that stirred her young heart for the firsttime. Raoul followed her and they talked till the evening, very shyly.They were quite changed, cautious as two diplomatists, and told eachother things that had nothing to do with their budding sentiments.When they took leave of each other by the roadside, Raoul, pressing akiss on Christine's trembling hand, said:
"Mademoiselle, I shall never forget you!"
And he went away regretting his words, for he knew that Christine couldnot be the wife of the Vicomte de Chagny.
As for Christine, she tried not to think of him and devoted herselfwholly to her art. She made wonderful progress and those who heard herprophesied that she would be the greatest singer in the world.Meanwhile, the father died; and, suddenly, she seemed to have lost,with him, her voice, her soul and her genius. She retained just, butonly just, enough of this to enter the CONSERVATOIRE, where she did notdistinguish herself at all, attending the classes without enthusiasmand taking a prize only to please old Mamma Valerius, with whom shecontinued to live.
The first time that Raoul saw Christine at the Opera, he was charmed bythe girl's beauty and by the sweet images of the past which it evoked,but was rather surprised at the negative side of her art. He returnedto listen to her. He followed her in the wings. He waited for herbehind a Jacob's ladder. He tried to attract her attention. More thanonce, he walked after her to the door of her box, but she did not seehim. She seemed, for that matter, to see nobody. She was allindifference. Raoul suffered, for she was very beautiful and he wasshy and dared not confess his love, even to himself. And then came thelightning-flash of the gala performance: the heavens torn asunder andan angel's voice heard upon earth for the delight of mankind and theutter capture of his heart.
And then ... and then there was that man's voice behind the door--"Youmust love me!"--and no one in the room...
Why did she laugh when he reminded her of the incident of the scarf?Why did she not recognize him? And why had she written to him? ...
Perros was reached at last. Raoul walked into the smoky sitting-roomof the Setting Sun and at once saw Christine standing before him,smiling and showing no astonishment.
"So you have come," she said. "I felt that I should find you here,when I came back from mass. Some one told me so, at the church."
"Who?" asked Raoul, taking her little hand in his.
"Why, my poor father, who is dead."
There was a silence; and then Raoul asked:
"Did your father tell you that I love you, Christine, and that I cannot live without you?"
Christine blushed to the eyes and turned away her head. In a tremblingvoice, she said:
"Me? You are dreaming, my friend!"
And she burst out laughing, to put herself in countenance.
"Don't laugh, Christine; I am quite serious," Raoul answered.
And she replied gravely: "I did not make you come to tell me suchthings as that."
"You 'made me come,' Christine; you knew that your letter would notleave me indignant and that I should hasten to Perros. How can youhave thought that, if you did not think I loved you?"
"I thought you would remember our games here, as children, in which myfather so often joined. I really don't know what I thought... PerhapsI was wrong to write to you ... This anniversary and your suddenappearance in my room at the Opera, the other evening, reminded me ofthe time long past and made me write to you as the little girl that Ithen was..."
There was something in Christine's attitude that seemed to Raoul notnatural. He did not feel any hostility in her; far from it: thedistressed affection shining in her eyes told him that. But why wasthis affection distressed? That was what he wished to know and whatwas irritating him.
"When you saw me in your dressing-room, was that the first time younoticed me, Christine?"
She was incapable of lying.
"No," she said, "I had seen you several times in your brother's box.And also on the stage."
"I thought so!" said Raoul, compressing his lips. "But then why, whenyou saw me in your room, at your feet, reminding you that I had rescuedyour scarf from the sea, why did you answer as though you did not knowme and also why did you laugh?"
The tone of these questions was so rough that Christine stared at Raoulwithout replying. The young man himself was aghast at the suddenquarrel which he had dared to raise at the very moment when he hadresolved to speak words of gentleness, love and submission toChristine. A husband, a lover with all rights, would talk nodifferently to a wife, a mistress who had offended him. But he hadgone too far and saw no other way out of the ridiculous position thanto behave odiously.
"You don't answer!" he said angrily and unhappily. "Well, I willanswer for you. It was because there was some one in the room who wasin your way, Christine, some one that you did not wish to know that youcould be interested in any one else!"
"If any one was in my way, my friend," Christine broke in coldly, "ifany one was in my way, that evening, it was yourself, since I told youto leave the room!"
"Yes, so that you might remain with the other!"
"What are you saying, monsieur?" asked the girl excitedly. "And towhat other do you refer?"
"To the man to whom you said, 'I sing only for you! ... to-night I gaveyou my soul and I am dead!'"
Christine seized Raoul's arm and clutched it with a strength which noone would have suspected in so frail a creature.
"Then you were listening behind the door?"
"Yes, because I love you everything ... And I heard everything ..."
"You heard what?"
And the young girl, becoming strangely calm, released Raoul's arm.
"He said to you, 'Christine, you must love me!'"
At these words, a deathly pallor spread over Christine's face, darkrings formed round her eyes, she staggered and seemed on the point ofswooning. Raoul darted forward, with arms outstretched, but Christinehad overcome her passing faintness and said, in a low voice:
"Go on! Go on! Tell me all you heard!"
At an utter loss to understand, Raoul answered: "I heard him reply,when you said you had given him your soul, 'Your soul is a beautifulthing, child, and I thank you. No emperor ever received so fair agift. The angels wept tonight.'"
Christine carried her hand to her heart, a prey to indescribableemotion. Her eyes stared before her like a madwoman's. Raoul wasterror-stricken. But suddenly Christine's eyes moistened and two greattears trickled, like two pearls, down her ivory cheeks.
"Christine!"
"Raoul!"
The young man tried to take her in his arms, but she escaped and fledin great disorder.
While Christine remained locked in her room, Raoul was at his wit's endwhat to do. He refused to breakfast. He was terribly concerned andbitterly grieved to see the hours, which he had hoped to find so sweet,slip past without the presence of the young Swedish girl. Why did shenot come to roam with him through the country where they had so manymemories in common? He heard that she had had a mass said, thatmorning, for the repose of her father's soul and spent a long timepraying in the little church and on the fiddler's tomb. Then, as sheseemed to have nothing more to do at Perros and, in fact, was doingnothing there, why did she not go back to Paris at once?
Raoul walked away, dejectedly, to the graveyard in which the churchstood and was indeed alone among the tombs, reading the inscriptions;but, when he turned behind the apse, he was suddenly struck by thedazzling note of the flowers that straggled over the white ground.They were marvelous red roses that had blossomed in the morning, in thesnow, giving a glimpse of life among the dead, for death was all aroundhim. It also, like the flowers, issued from the ground, which hadflung back a number of its corpses. Skeletons and skulls by thehundred were heaped against the wall of the church, held in position bya wire that left the whole gruesome stack visible. Dead men's bones,arranged in rows, like bricks, to form the first course upon which thewalls of the sacristy had been built. The door of the sacristy openedin the middle of that bony structure, as is often seen in old Bretonchurches.
Raoul said a prayer for Daae and then, painfully impressed by all thoseeternal smiles on the mouths of skulls, he climbed the slope and satdown on the edge of the heath overlooking the sea. The wind fell withthe evening. Raoul was surrounded by icy darkness, but he did not feelthe cold. It was here, he remembered, that he used to come with littleChristine to see the Korrigans dance at the rising of the moon. He hadnever seen any, though his eyes were good, whereas Christine, who was alittle shortsighted, pretended that she had seen many. He smiled atthe thought and then suddenly gave a start. A voice behind him said:
"Do you think the Korrigans will come this evening?"
It was Christine. He tried to speak. She put her gloved hand on hismouth.
"Listen, Raoul. I have decided to tell you something serious, veryserious ... Do you remember the legend of the Angel of Music?"
"I do indeed," he said. "I believe it was here that your father firsttold it to us."
"And it was here that he said, 'When I am in Heaven, my child, I willsend him to you.' Well, Raoul, my father is in Heaven, and I have beenvisited by the Angel of Music."
"I have no doubt of it," replied the young man gravely, for it seemedto him that his friend, in obedience to a pious thought, was connectingthe memory of her father with the brilliancy of her last triumph.
Christine appeared astonished at the Vicomte de Chagny's coolness:
"How do you understand it?" she asked, bringing her pale face so closeto his that he might have thought that Christine was going to give hima kiss; but she only wanted to read his eyes in spite of the dark.
"I understand," he said, "that no human being can sing as you sang theother evening without the intervention of some miracle. No professoron earth can teach you such accents as those. You have heard the Angelof Music, Christine."
"Yes," she said solemnly, "IN MY DRESSING-ROOM. That is where he comesto give me my lessons daily."
"In your dressing-room?" he echoed stupidly.
"Yes, that is where I have heard him; and I have not been the only oneto hear him."
"Who else heard him, Christine?"
"You, my friend."
"I? I heard the Angel of Music?"
"Yes, the other evening, it was he who was talking when you werelistening behind the door. It was he who said, 'You must love me.' ButI then thought that I was the only one to hear his voice. Imagine myastonishment when you told me, this morning, that you could hear himtoo."
Raoul burst out laughing. The first rays of the moon came and shroudedthe two young people in their light. Christine turned on Raoul with ahostile air. Her eyes, usually so gentle, flashed fire.
"What are you laughing at? YOU think you heard a man's voice, Isuppose?"
"Well! ..." replied the young man, whose ideas began to grow confusedin the face of Christine's determined attitude.
"It's you, Raoul, who say that? You, an old playfellow of my own! Afriend of my father's! But you have changed since those days. What areyou thinking of? I am an honest girl, M. le Vicomte de Chagny, and Idon't lock myself up in my dressing-room with men's voices. If you hadopened the door, you would have seen that there was nobody in the room!"
"That's true! I did open the door, when you were gone, and I found noone in the room."
"So you see! ... Well?"
The viscount summoned up all his courage.
"Well, Christine, I think that somebody is making game of you."
She gave a cry and ran away. He ran after her, but, in a tone offierce anger, she called out: "Leave me! Leave me!" And shedisappeared.
Raoul returned to the inn feeling very weary, very low-spirited andvery sad. He was told that Christine had gone to her bedroom sayingthat she would not be down to dinner. Raoul dined alone, in a verygloomy mood. Then he went to his room and tried to read, went to bedand tried to sleep. There was no sound in the next room.
The hours passed slowly. It was about half-past eleven when hedistinctly heard some one moving, with a light, stealthy step, in theroom next to his. Then Christine had not gone to bed! Withouttroubling for a reason, Raoul dressed, taking care not to make a sound,and waited. Waited for what? How could he tell? But his heartthumped in his chest when he heard Christine's door turn slowly on itshinges. Where could she be going, at this hour, when every one wasfast asleep at Perros? Softly opening the door, he saw Christine'swhite form, in the moonlight, slipping along the passage. She wentdown the stairs and he leaned over the baluster above her. Suddenly heheard two voices in rapid conversation. He caught one sentence: "Don'tlose the key."
It was the landlady's voice. The door facing the sea was opened andlocked again. Then all was still.
Raoul ran back to his room and threw back the window. Christine'swhite form stood on the deserted quay.
The first floor of the Setting Sun was at no great height and a treegrowing against the wall held out its branches to Raoul's impatientarms and enabled him to climb down unknown to the landlady. Heramazement, therefore, was all the greater when, the next morning, theyoung man was brought back to her half frozen, more dead than alive,and when she learned that he had been found stretched at full length onthe steps of the high altar of the little church. She ran at once totell Christine, who hurried down and, with the help of the landlady,did her best to revive him. He soon opened his eyes and was not longin recovering when he saw his friend's charming face leaning over him.
A few weeks later, when the tragedy at the Opera compelled theintervent
ion of the public prosecutor, M. Mifroid, the commissary ofpolice, examined the Vicomte de Chagny touching the events of the nightat Perros. I quote the questions and answers as given in the officialreport pp. 150 et seq.:
Q. "Did Mlle. Daae not see you come down from your room by the curiousroad which you selected?"
R. "No, monsieur, no, although, when walking behind her, I took nopains to deaden the sound of my footsteps. In fact, I was anxious thatshe should turn round and see me. I realized that I had no excuse forfollowing her and that this way of spying on her was unworthy of me.But she seemed not to hear me and acted exactly as though I were notthere. She quietly left the quay and then suddenly walked quickly upthe road. The church-clock had struck a quarter to twelve and Ithought that this must have made her hurry, for she began almost to runand continued hastening until she came to the church."
Q. "Was the gate open?"
R. "Yes, monsieur, and this surprised me, but did not seem to surpriseMlle. Daae."
Q. "Was there no one in the churchyard?"
R. "I did not see any one; and, if there had been, I must have seenhim. The moon was shining on the snow and made the night quite light."
Q. "Was it possible for any one to hide behind the tombstones?"
R. "No, monsieur. They were quite small, poor tombstones, partlyhidden under the snow, with their crosses just above the level of theground. The only shadows were those of the crosses and ourselves. Thechurch stood out quite brightly. I never saw so clear a night. It wasvery fine and very cold and one could see everything."
Q. "Are you at all superstitious?"
R. "No, monsieur, I am a practising Catholic,"
Q. "In what condition of mind were you?"
R. "Very healthy and peaceful, I assure you. Mlle. Daae's curiousaction in going out at that hour had worried me at first; but, as soonas I saw her go to the churchyard, I thought that she meant to fulfilsome pious duty on her father's grave and I considered this so naturalthat I recovered all my calmness. I was only surprised that she hadnot heard me walking behind her, for my footsteps were quite audible onthe hard snow. But she must have been taken up with her intentions andI resolved not to disturb her. She knelt down by her father's grave,made the sign of the cross and began to pray. At that moment, itstruck midnight. At the last stroke, I saw Mlle. Daae life{sic} hereyes to the sky and stretch out her arms as though in ecstasy. I waswondering what the reason could be, when I myself raised my head andeverything within me seemed drawn toward the invisible, WHICH WASPLAYING THE MOST PERFECT MUSIC! Christine and I knew that music; wehad heard it as children. But it had never been executed with suchdivine art, even by M. Daae. I remembered all that Christine had toldme of the Angel of Music. The air was The Resurrection of Lazarus,which old M. Daae used to play to us in his hours of melancholy and offaith. If Christine's Angel had existed, he could not have playedbetter, that night, on the late musician's violin. When the musicstopped, I seemed to hear a noise from the skulls in the heap of bones;it was as though they were chuckling and I could not help shuddering."
Q. "Did it not occur to you that the musician might be hiding behindthat very heap of bones?"
R. "It was the one thought that did occur to me, monsieur, so much sothat I omitted to follow Mlle. Daae, when she stood up and walkedslowly to the gate. She was so much absorbed just then that I am notsurprised that she did not see me."
Q. "Then what happened that you were found in the morning lyinghalf-dead on the steps of the high altar?"
R. "First a skull rolled to my feet ... then another ... then another... It was as if I were the mark of that ghastly game of bowls. And Ihad an idea that false step must have destroyed the balance of thestructure behind which our musician was concealed. This surmise seemedto be confirmed when I saw a shadow suddenly glide along the sacristywall. I ran up. The shadow had already pushed open the door andentered the church. But I was quicker than the shadow and caught holdof a corner of its cloak. At that moment, we were just in front of thehigh altar; and the moonbeams fell straight upon us through thestained-glass windows of the apse. As I did not let go of the cloak,the shadow turned round; and I saw a terrible death's head, whichdarted a look at me from a pair of scorching eyes. I felt as if I wereface to face with Satan; and, in the presence of this unearthlyapparition, my heart gave way, my courage failed me ... and I remembernothing more until I recovered consciousness at the Setting Sun."
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