by Heather Webb
Like hell. Still, I forced myself not to lean away from him, ever-aware of my mission.
“Don’t go through my things again,” he snarled. “Or there will be consequences.”
“I just . . . I just want to know you. Your music.” I swallowed, plunging deeply to find my courage. The words came out in a whisper. “Your illusions.”
Candlelight danced across the surface of his mask. He reached for me.
I froze as he brushed a curl from my forehead, ran a gloved finger down my cheek and neck—and across the exposed mounds of my breasts again. My insides squirmed as he leaned forward and planted a kiss on my forehead. After, he jerked upright and stalked to his trunks. Within seconds, he unlocked one and fished out a stack of notebooks.
“You wish to know me,” he said. “This is the best way. My secrets.”
Taken aback by his sudden change of heart, I remained silent.
“Well?” he growled. “Would you like them or not?”
I shifted on the bed. “I don’t understand.”
“I’ve taken you against your will. The least I can do is prove to you I am a man of heart, a man of great knowledge.”
I stifled my response. The redeeming facets of his character disappeared under the weight of his crimes. Still, I wouldn’t turn down his offer. This was the best way to gain his trust—and the best way to learn his illusions!
I accepted the two volumes gratefully. “Perhaps you might teach me?”
Conflicting emotions raged in his eyes, then a knowing smile followed by confusion. “I thought singing was your passion. Your father—”
“Taught me to sing, yes, and encouraged me every day. I do love to sing, but—” I wasn’t sure how to finish the thought. “Something has changed.”
He shook his head. “Women are assistants, not illusionists. You can read the volumes, but I won’t teach you.” He reached for the ribbon at my elbow and caressed it between his thumb and forefinger. “It’s too dangerous.”
“Not always.” I looked away, embarrassed by how small my voice sounded, how uncertain.
He chuckled. “Nearly always, dear one.”
Annoyed by his dismissive laughter, I stuck out my chin. “There was Nella Davenport the illusionist and the Belgian, Datura.”
“You have studied.”
“A conjurer told me about them once, when I was young. He showed me how to do a few simple illusions. I have practiced on my own since then.” I sniffed, put off by his incredulity. I was perfectly capable of learning, regardless of my sex. After a moment’s pause, I lowered my eyes. Voice soft, I added, “Illusions comforted me when I lost Mother. She used to reward me with sleights of hand—a ball or a wand or a deck of cards—when I finished my singing lessons. She loved them. Illusions remind me of her still.”
Now I wanted to be an illusionist as she had—regardless of the difficulty, despite the hours of practice needed, the money to get started. I could perform at salons, gain an audience slowly. I didn’t have to live out someone else’s dreams, even if they were dear Papa’s. I had my own.
Erik studied me without a word.
Maybe if I showed him how we were alike in our love of magic—that I identified with him—he would be lulled into teaching me.
“Perhaps, I could learn from you, as your apprentice. We are so alike, you and I. Both singers, both passionate about wonder and magic and make-believe. This is why we felt an immediate affinity for one another, n’est-ce pas? I just . . . I just want to work with a master.” I forced out the final sentence. “With someone I care for deeply.”
“I shared my music with you, and even gave you my books.” The edge returned to his voice. “Now you want me to teach you conjuring? Rather demanding, aren’t we?”
I smoothed the silk skirts of my gown, measuring my next words. His need for acceptance and self-admiration seemed more important than anything else—greater, even, than winning me. I looked up from beneath my fringe of lashes. “Just think of all you can teach me. That which no one else has done before, or will be able to do ever after. Your expertise is unparalleled.”
“I was an apprentice at one time, long ago.” He shook his head. “But you’re a talented singer, and music suits you. You wouldn’t have to struggle the way you would as a magician. As a singer, I can ensure you’re in the lead, as you deserve. It’s safer, more assured.”
“I want to learn illusions,” I said firmly. “And you’re the person I want to teach me.”
He glared at me. “Headstrong woman.”
I had never thought so, but I liked the idea and smiled.
“If I taught you”—he went on—“it would mean you have to stay here, a little longer, at least.”
A thought I hadn’t considered. Realizing my mistake, I swallowed hard, but squeezed his hand in a show of good faith. “Yes, it would.”
He was startled by the unexpected display of affection, but then his smile unfurled, displaying his long white teeth. His thin lips all but disappeared.
I cringed inwardly. He looked more skeletal than human. I reminded myself this was the same man who had taught me exquisite music and rescued me in my darkest need, and forced a smile in return.
“Very well, dear one. Why don’t we begin?” He motioned for me to join him at a table. “The first thing you must learn is how an illusionist thinks. How he views the world around him.
“The basic principle,” he went on, “is to play on the way a normal individual perceives an object and the space it encompasses.” He performed a series of illusions with a small ball. The object disappeared into his sleeve, and then into his pockets.
When he finished, I plucked the ball from his fingers, careful not to make contact with his skin, and repeated each of his illusions.
Surprise crossed his face. “You are proficient at sleight of hand.”
“Quite.” I smiled.
He sat taller, as if to prepare himself for the challenge of impressing a worthy student. I felt I was, and I smiled again.
“Good. On to the next principle,” he said. “You can make the audience believe they have a choice when you are leading them by the power of suggestion. If done well, they will always choose what you wish them to.”
I nodded. “For example, the number illusion. Choose a number between one and seven, but not four. By suggesting certain numbers, you have planted them in the person’s mind. Highlighting them, in a sense.”
He bared his skeletal smile once more. “A simple example, but it seems you understand this principle as well.”
“I suppose the next theory you will explain is the use of ambiguous language, or perhaps the simple tactic of distraction. As you show the crowd a colorful array of scarves, your assistant inserts a rabbit into your top hat upon the mirrored table. The true illusion happens elsewhere, outside of the scarves.”
His smile twisted into a grimace. “If you know all of this, why did you ask me for help?”
I clamped my mouth closed. I had to remember his fragility.
“I understand the principles well,” I said, “and I am proficient at sleight of hand. I’ve learned a bit about box illusions with mirrored panels. The bullet catch as well, though I’ve never actually attempted it. I am interested in more challenging illusions. Freeing oneself from chains.” My voice dropped. “How to conjure spirits, and most importantly of all: how to disappear.”
He crossed his arms over his chest, his black jacket bunching at the elbows. “If I share all of these with you, what sort of act would I have left to call my own?”
“But you won’t perform again.”
“One never knows.”
I felt my face fall, my hope deflate. Those were the illusions I wanted to learn. I thought of the séance Monsieur Delacroix had facilitated that hot summer evening, months ago. He had appeared smug until I had gasped at the mention of the Angel and ran from the room. Had it made him doubt? I knew contacting spirits was a contrived act, but I had begun to question if spirits were real
anyway—until Erik’s true identity had been revealed. Now I knew for certain: A soul returning from the grave was also merely an illusion, conjured by those who wished to believe.
“You said yourself, I am merely a woman. What are the chances I would ever use your illusions? Anyway, I would need my own ideas to make a name for myself.”
He steepled his fingers. “Why don’t you perform an illusion for me? I’d like to see you in action. Keep in mind, your delivery is as important as your act. You are a player on a stage, and the crowd wants to be amazed. They want to fall for your persona, to believe in your skill. You must make them love you—or hate you—but eliciting a strong emotion is essential. Indifference is death.”
Suddenly I felt timid. I didn’t have a routine in mind, and I had no props. I didn’t know what my act would be or the themes I’d use. I had only seen two conjurers’ shows; the rest I had learned from books. What I knew about being on stage came from the opera. I thought of my time as a page boy or a pupil, a butterfly, a courtesan, and the myriad of other roles for which I had posed in musical productions. I had had plenty of time and experience being someone else in front of an audience. But who I truly was—who I wanted to present to the world—I had yet to discover.
“I don’t have my props. I only possess a few, anyway, and nothing elaborate. I’m a beginner. This is why I need your help.”
He considered my plea while studying my face. I longed to look away from his troubled eyes, the grim mouth, and the shining mask; but that would shame him, and the delicate new thread connecting us would snap.
He sighed heavily. “I can’t say no to you.” He swept across the room, cape billowing behind him, and fished a set of drawings out of one of his trunks. “We’ll raise a spirit from the dead. I can’t lay out the full illusion here, but I can show you how it’s done.”
He spread the drawings out on a table. “See how the cellar below the stage is deep? This is where you hide the body.” He pointed to another drawing with a plane of wood set at an angle. “The person lies here against this tilted plane. You project a bright light straight at the individual, and above him, there is a large pane of glass on the stage. That throws the person’s muted reflection into the air. When the person below stage moves, the ghost moves, too, and there you have your spirit.”
My eyes bulged. “It’s brilliant! How did you figure out the lighting?”
“Most illusions are about lighting, ingenuity, and—”
“Science,” I said, smiling. “Inventions, gears, and machines. My favorite things.”
“Indeed.” Something shifted in his eyes, as if he were seeing me for the first time—as if he realized he didn’t know me at all. “You surprise me, Nanette.”
“‘Nanette’?” I snapped to attention, heart jumping into my throat. “That’s my mother’s name.”
“Isn’t it your second name as well?” he asked, looking away.
“How did you know?” I asked, unease turning my stomach.
His tone turned impatient. “Would you like to see more or not?”
After a moment of hesitation, I nodded. “I’d like to see as much as you’ll share.”
He smiled his skeletal smile.
21
Erik and I practiced new illusions: flowers that multiplied inside a cone and cascaded to the ground, pulling endless ribbon from a top hat, a disappearing act with the help of a special cabinet or trunk, and—one of his favorites—escaping from handcuffs. In spite of myself, I read his notes hungrily, soaking up his instructions and anecdotes. He’d sketched illusions performed by other celebrated conjurers in his notes as well: Hermann’s card-throwing, the Davenport brothers’ spirit cabinet, Pepper’s ghost, and Dekolta’s vanishing birdcage. But we spent the majority of our time on the theatrical skits he insisted were the most important element of the show.
“Costume and dialogue emphasize the magic of the illusions,” he said often.
“Where did you learn how to do all of this?” I asked one day.
“Much of it is self-taught. Some I learned from watching others, but the most difficult and interesting of my illusions I learned while living in Persia.”
Persia? There was much more to Erik than I expected. And then I remembered the shadowy man I’d seen once in the music chamber, and Meg’s mention of his friendship with Erik.
After hours of demonstrations, he would lead singing practice, and I would do his bidding without complaint. Still, his patience wore thin when I fatigued or when I needed to eat, and he grew truly frightening when I wanted to spend time alone.
Though I absorbed the instruction and delighted in my newfound knowledge, I yearned to go home. Madame needed me, I worried about Delacroix’s reaction to my disappearance, and I couldn’t wait to show Claudette all I’d learned. Nor could I stop thinking about Raoul. Did he assume I had run away with Erik? The thought vexed me to the point of nausea. No matter how much Erik shared with me, no matter how much time I spent in his presence, I feared what he might do. When I didn’t learn a new song as quickly as he liked, he would snap, raise his voice, and belittle me, or clutch my arm too hard. At times, he would gaze into my face with adoration, then startle out of his reverie as if realizing, for the first time, who I was. By lesson’s end, his eyes would shift from vivid to angered, or worse, to sorrowful. He walked a narrow line between madness and lucidity, and I wondered how long it would be before he tipped into a world of eternal night. I didn’t want to be there when that day came.
After a lengthy lesson and a particularly irritable exchange with Erik, I collapsed and fell into a deep sleep, for how long I couldn’t tell. When I closed my eyes, Raoul’s face appeared. I thought constantly of Madame and Claudette, my family. Were they looking for me? If only I could send them a message somehow.
I didn’t see Erik for hours? Days? Food and pretty cakes appeared on trays at regular intervals in the bedchamber as if I were a noble waited on by an invisible servant. Without daylight or clocks, time became fluid, a stream of unending moments. I revisited the organ room many times in an attempt to escape, trying in vain to find the passage Erik used. It was too well-hidden. I wound my way along the passage to the lake again and stood at the water’s edge, yearning for a boat to magically appear on the dock nearest me. My time there needed to come to an end. I had learned enough, and longed to go home with every inch of my being.
Despairing, I rifled through Erik’s trunks again in search of something—anything—that might give me a clue as to how to escape. While sorting through his notebooks, I noticed a stack of papers I hadn’t seen the first time I’d gone through his things. Carefully, I unfolded the series of labeled drawings.
My mouth fell open in surprise.
The drawings were maps of the opera house, its various floors and system of underground passageways. Heart beating wildly, I traced the space marked “bedroom” with my fingertip. The room narrowed into a passageway—the one I had discovered—with its end flanked by an oval marked “lake.” On the shore opposite the tunnel, a set of steps led to the next floor up, but from there, a series of trapdoors, another tunnel, and three more flights of stairs led to different points in the building, none of which led outside. One of the tunnels lead to the main hall.
Rushing back to the bed, I began copying the maps onto blank paper in minute detail. My hand cramped as it flew over the page, sketching each path, room, or hidden door. I paused when I came to the bedroom sheet again. In the corner adjacent to the room, Erik had drawn a large box. I frowned, pulling the map closer to make out the fine print. It read: rotating door.
There was another way out!
I leapt from the bed and turned the map in my hands until it aligned with my position in the room. The wall behind the armoire should pivot, according to the drawing. I strode to the correct spot, and glanced at the paper once more. The door worked with a lever and counterweight. I studied the floor and the wall in search of the telltale lever. There it was, hidden behind the back leg of th
e armoire. I slid my foot into the space beneath the furniture and mashed down on the lever. The pivot triggered and the wall turned rapidly. Heart pounding, I faced what appeared to be a storage room of foodstuffs, oil, and pieces of furniture. A deep recess spanned the back wall. Hope filled me until I felt bouyant.
I raced toward it and stepped inside the darkened hole. To my chagrin, there were no escape doors or staircase, only a slide. I climbed onto the bottom of the slide and peered up to see where it led. Its curvature twisted and disappeared into a dark chasm. The slide provided a way into the lair, but no way out. Disappointment speared me through. Back to finding another plan.
“Christine!” The Angel’s voice echoed from a distance.
My heart leapt in my chest. I glanced down at the carefully copied maps. I would keep them, just in case. I folded the notes hastily, one by one, and stuffed them inside my pantaloons.
“Christine, answer me!” Erik’s voice grew closer.
I raced to the door, yanked the counterweight, and the panel rotated.
“Hello, Erik,” I called as I rushed into the bedroom. “I’m dressing. Give me a moment more of privacy, please.” I tossed the books into his trunk, and dashed back to the bed, pulling out the remaining copied pages. When all had been secured, I straightened my skirts and smoothed my hair. “Thank you. I’m ready now.”
He stalked into the room and stood over me, breath fanning hot across my neck.
I strained not to grimace at his nearness, or to stare at the scar that ran along one side of his jaw and bulged in places along his neckline. Instead I focused on his eyes, which smoldered like the embers of a fire. They beheld me with such intensity, I grew fearful of what thoughts lay behind them. Against my will, I shuddered.
“I’m so hideous to behold, you shiver at my appearance.” He gripped my arm harder than he ever had before.
“No, that’s not it!” I cried out, in part from the agony of his grip. “I am cold, is all. It’s very damp down here and I’ve only just changed clothes.”