Tales of the Shadowmen 2: Gentlemen of the Night

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Tales of the Shadowmen 2: Gentlemen of the Night Page 20

by Jean-Marc Lofficier


  As Percy Stuart was toasting his cousin’s success, and as Lord Stuart was accepting the acclaim of the club with a false modesty that ill became him, Lord Stuart’s mansion was being carefully inspected by an unannounced visitor. Several dainties were removed from a concealed space beneath the floor of the bedroom, including a 17th century Bourdon painting of King Solomon confronting a demon, Hallward’s 36 Views of Tyburn Tree–and the Moonstone. Lord Stuart’s visitor left no calling card–he lacked the panache of Professor Pelotard–but among the community of fingersmiths, it was soon known that the Englishman Raffles was discretely boasting about his possession of the Moonstone.

  I have been asked about Raffles’ claims, and I have always laughed and declined to answer.

  I enjoy the occasional jape at my English friends’ expense–though Holmes and Blake have not often seen the humor–and, one day, I shall let Raffles in on my little joke. Raffles–or whoever gains final ownership of the stone, for I’m reliably informed that several of Raffles’ lesser-known and quite jealous compeers are on their way to London from Europe, America, and as far away as China to pay M. Raffles a visit.

  You see, I have the Moonstone.

  Raffles has only a glass duplicate. The Moonstone was never allowed to reside in the Louvre. I was the patron who wished to remain nameless, and I gave a cunningly-wrought imitation diamond–supposedly crafted by the hand of René Cardillac himself–into the keeping of the Louvre. The thought of my contemporaries expending their time and energy against each other and toward the end of gaining a chunk of glass amused me.

  What else would one expect of Arsène Lupin?

  Kim Newman was among the first writers to have different characters from popular fiction meet, love and do battle. His wildly imaginative and exceedingly well-researched Anno Dracula series remains the model against which any crossover fiction must be judged. Kim is also unique in that he exhibits a refreshing knowledge of works from non-English-speaking countries and a daring willingness to mix genre boundaries. There could be no better demonstration of his wit and elegance than this cheerful, action-packed romp in which, once upon a time, there were three little girls who went to the Opéra…

  Kim Newman: Angels of Music

  Paris, 1878

  In the ’70s–that colorful, hectic decade of garish clothes, corrupt politics, personal excess and trivial music–three girls were sent to the Paris Opéra. They could dance a little, sing a little more, were comely when painted and cut fine female figures in tights. Were the world just, they would have been stars in the ascendant, rewarded with fame, riches and advantageous marriages.

  However, a rigid system of seniority, patronage and favor-currying then governed the house. Our heroines, no matter how perfectly they trilled audition pieces or daintily they lifted skirts from shapely calves, were of the “untouchable” caste, and fated to remain in the depths of the chorus. If critic or admirer or patron were to call public attention to their qualities, they would likely find themselves cast then as blackface slaves in the next production, holding the Queen’s train at the rear of the stage. Such was the ruthless dictate of the house’s reigning diva, Signorina Carlotta Castafiore.

  Yet… Christine Daae had a Voice. Trilby O’Ferrall had a Face. And Irene Adler had a Mind. When they arrived at the Opéra, these girls were gems in the rough. To be revealed as brilliants of the first water, they required polish, cutting and careful setting. Without such treatment, they were likely to become dull pebbles, lost among so many other stones.

  Many equally appealing girls have served years in the chorus as their brothers served terms in the armed forces (or prison), trying not to squander meager pay on absinthe or cards, hoping to emerge whole in limb from regular ordeals, dreaming of comfortable retirement. At best, they might end up the second wives of comfortable widowers; at worst, they might… well, at worst is too hideous to be dwelled upon, save to observe that such as they are found ragged on the cobbles or drowned in the Seine with a frequency that verges on the scandalous.

  These demoiselles tended to attract the puppy-like devotions of decent, dull-witted youths and the carnivorous attentions of indecent, cold-hearted roués. Our trio, in their private dreams, yearned for quite a different stripe of suitor–mysterious, dominating, challenging. Without such a presence in their lives, the girls lacked direction. But, even kept outside the circle of the limelight, they had an unnerving tendency to sparkle. La Carlotta saw that shimmering in her wake, and made sure it stayed in shadow. Nevertheless, one by one, they were noticed, not by the stuffy and harassed management or the violently partisan audience cliques, but by a personage who saw into their secret selves.

  This unique individual was at once Christine’s Trapdoor Lover, Trilby’s Mesmerist Genius and Irene’s Mastermind of Intrigue. All Paris knew him as the Phantom of the Opéra, though most deemed him a true phantasm, conjured by stagehands intent on throwing a scare into pretty little ballerinas. Those who knew more, who had cause to believe the Phantom of the Opéra a man of flesh and bone, knew better than to speak of him overmuch.

  His protegées came to know him by his true name, Monsieur Erik.

  Among the very few who shared this privileged information was the Persian–a long-faced, astrakhan-capped fellow whose exact function at the opera house was hard to determine but evidently essential. The girls flitted through a surface world of upholstered finery, fashionable cafés and society engagements, of grand opening nights and merry madcap balls; the Phantom of the Opéra confined himself to the decaying, watery labyrinth beneath Garnier’s great building, among the tombs of tortured men. Only the Persian could pass easily between the two realms. It was said he was the only man living who had seen the true face behind mirror and mask, though some claimed to have glimpsed a hollow-eyed, noseless specter in Box No. 5, upon which he had a permanent lease.

  From behind the mirror in their shared dressing room, Erik gave “music lessons,” whispering for hours to his songbirds–his French nightingale, Irish thrush and American eagle. He first discovered Daae, his most naturally-gifted pupil, calling from her a voice to rival the angels. Moreover, he taught her to feel the music, to imbue the polite perfection of her natural tones with the rude turbulence of her young heart. Thanks to Erik, Christine’s voice could reach and affect in a manner those who heard it would never forget, though for her finest performances her only auditor was a single, tattered soul weeping under his mask. O’Ferrall, near death after a spell under another mesmerist-tutor, was cracked in voice, body and spirit when she was brought to Erik. He repaired her voice if not to its former, artificial magnificence–once, briefly, she had performed at the highest level–then at least to pleasant adequacy. Not a natural singer like Christine, Trilby was, if properly presented, the greatest beauty of her era, an attainment involving at least as much sacrifice and special exercise as musical distinction. Adler, the American, was warier, less obviously gifted, too strong-willed for the special tutelage Erik bestowed upon her comrades, but prodigiously gifted in a surprising range of skills. Irene’s involvement with the Agency was a matter of negotiation towards mutual advantage rather than submission to the will of the Phantom of the Opéra.

  Each, in her own way, benefitted from Erik’s work with them, and grew when they all worked together. Collaboration went against the instincts of the potential diva in each girl but made them more effective as a trio than they would have been as three solo turns.

  It was circulated in the proverbial circles that those who wished to engage a certain Agency must first make contact with the Persian or, for more delicate matters, Madame Giry, the Keeper of Box No. 5. These loyal operatives would convey the details of the case to the Phantom himself. Often Erik was already well-apprised of matters in which prospective clients wished him to take an interest. Thanks to an intricate array of tubes and shutters, he could eavesdrop on gossip uttered in any box, dressing room or lavatory in the house–and few matters of moment troubled the city without being discus
sed somewhere within the Paris Opéra. Once a case came to Erik’s attention, it was his decision–unaffected by the scale of fee on offer–whether a commission was accepted or declined.

  If accepted, a bell sounded.

  Bells were always ringing around the house, to summon artistes, dressers, musicians, commissionaires, wine-waiters, clerks, servants, composers, scene-shifters, rat-catchers, chorus girls, washer-women. Bells were sounded to alert the audience when a performance was about to commence or resume. Not to mention the cow-, sheep- or goat-bells used by the percussionists when pieces with rustic settings were given. Only the most finely-tuned ear could distinguish individual sounds among such tintinnabulation. But our three girls knew their bell. When it sounded, anything they happened to be doing–no matter how important–was set aside in their haste to make their way to a dressing room at the end of a basement corridor which had apparently been abandoned as too far from the great stage for convenience.

  When Erik rang the bell, Christine Daae was in a scuttle-shaped bathtub, all a-lather, singing scales… Trilby O’Ferrall was posing in a sunlit upper room for a class of impoverished art students who’d pooled meager funds to purchase an hour of her time… and Irene Adler was practicing her lock-picking blindfolded, working away with hairpins and clever fingers.

  Within moments, the tub stood empty, the students disappointed and the lock unpicked. The girls nipped swiftly to answer the summons, using dumb-waiters, trapdoors and other byways known only to the intimates of Charles Garnier. They arrived simultaneously at Dressing Room 313. The Persian, who was perusing the latest number of La Petite Presse, looked up and flapped a hand at them, the smoke from his Turkish cigarette making a question mark in the air. The trio arranged themselves on a divan before the large, green-speckled mirror: Christine and Trilby still wriggling into suitable clothes, helping each other with hooks and buttons, Irene coolly fanning herself with the scarf she had been using as a blindfold. When the Persian turned down the gaslight, it was possible to discern a chamber beyond the thin silvering of the mirror. A thin shadow stood there, extravagantly cloaked and hatted, violin tucked under his chin. Erik extemporized the sort of “hurry up” trill used to encourage unpopular acts to get off the stage as the French and Irish girls concluded their business with a minimum of pinching and tutting.

  “What’s the ruckus this time, Bright Boy?” asked Irene, whose speech still bore the pernicious influence of her native New Jersey. “Is some mug tryin’ ta knock over the Louvre again?”

  “Could it be a plot to bring down the Government?” asked Trilby.

  “Or detonate dynamite under Notre-Dame?” asked Christine.

  The Persian exhaled a smoke ring. “Nothing so everyday, ladies.”

  There was a pause, and all eyes turned to the mirror. Trilby, by a smidgen the prettiest of our trio and a long chalk the most vain, fussed a little with her short brown curls, accompanied by a teasing little violin tune, then noticed the others looking at her, smiled sweetly and put her hands in her lap as if about to listen dutifully to a sermon.

  The violin was set down and a sepulchral voice sounded, conveyed into the room through a speaking tube with a woodwind tone.

  “Our client,” said Erik, “is most exalted. In fact, a President.”

  “The President of the Republic!” exclaimed Christine, saluting.

  With the shortage of male chorus in the years since the war and the commune, the boyish Daae frame was often gussied up en travestie in braided uniform. She was better at close-order drill than anyone else in the company. Off duty, as it were, she often favored military-style tunics. Though her parentage was Swedish, she was a true French patriotess, who could have posed for the image of Marianne if, unlike Trilby, she were not addicted to the fidgets.

  “It can’t be that fathead in the White House!” said Irene Adler.

  “Ireland hasn’t got a President, more’s the pity,” muttered Trilby–born in Paris of an Irish father and a French mother, never to set foot on the green sod from which she inherited complexion and accent. “Just the cursed God English, and their fat little German Queen.”

  “Our client is far more respected than a mere head of state,” said Erik. “She is la Présidente. Apollonie Sabatier, née Aglaé Savatier. Her salon may be more vital to la Vie Parisienne than any Government building, museum or cathedral.”

  “Salon?” queried Christine.

  “He means whorehouse,” explained Irene. “What Miss Potato’s Limey oppressors call a ‘knocking-shop.’ ”

  Trilby good-humoredly stuck her tongue out at Irene.

  “I’ve heard of Madame Sabatier,” said Trilby. “She’s one of those ‘Horizontal Giantesses.’ ”

  “Indeed,” continued Erik. “The most upstanding, indeed paradoxically vertical, of the Nation’s Grandes Horizontales. You will have seen her portrait by Messonier, her statue by Clésinger.”

  “That Beaudelaire freak was nuts about her,” said Irene.

  There was a pause. It would be too easy to conceive of a yellowish, skeletal brow wrinkling in a frown, a lipless mouth attempting a moue of displeasure, a glint of irritation in sunken eyes.

  “What did I say?” whined Irene. “Everyone knows the guy was ga-ga for the dame. Did you ever see Beaudelaire? Weirdest-looking turkey this side of the state fair, mooning over this overpriced sporting gal. Most ridiculous thing you ever heard of. Just like Beauty and the Beast!”

  An exhalation of impatience hissed through the speaking tube.

  Irene thought over her last comments, looked again at the silhouette beyond the mirror and paled into rigid terror, awaiting the wrath of her employer. She had spoken without thinking, which was unlike her.

  Without the benefit of “music lessons,” Irene was less schooled than Christine and Trilby in the disciplines expected of Erik’s operatives.

  Eventually, the hissing became a normal susurrus, and Erik resumed.

  “It is true that the Salon Sabatier has been the haunt of poets and artists. La Présidente has admirers among our greatest creative minds.”

  “I know all about the minds of poets and painters,” said Trilby. “Filth and degeneracy is what goes around in their clever little brains. Enough scribblers and daubers have trotted after me. Ought to be ashamed, so they should.”

  Trilby spat in her hand and crossed herself. It was something her father often did when pledging to creditors that funds would be available by the end of the week, just before the O’Ferrall ménage moved to a new, usually less salubrious address.

  “Our client requires us to display great sensitivity and tact,” decreed Erik.

  “None of the tittle or the tattle,” said Christine.

  “Exactly. In the course of this investigation, you might well become privy to information which la Présidente and her particular friends …”

  “Johns,” put in Irene.

  “… would not wish to be generally known.”

  “Have you noticed how these fancy fellers always think their wives don’t know a thing?” said Trilby. “Bless their hearts. They’re like tiny children. Wouldn’t they be surprised if they knew what their missuses got up to while they’re tomcatting about the town?”

  All three girls laughed. Christine, it had to be said, often did not quite “get” the meaning of her friends’ comments–especially when, as often, they spoke in English–but was alert enough to conceal occasional ignorance by chiming in with musical giggles. Her chief trait was adorability, and foolish fellows were already composing remarkably poor sonnets about the smallness of her nose, with ambitions towards epic verse on the subject of the rest of her anatomy. Trilby was older than the others, though no one would ever tell to look at her, and her greater experience of the artistic life inclined her to be protective of her baby sisters. Foolish fellows in her presence tended to be struck dumb, as if she were a vision at Lourdes. Sometimes, a glazed look came into her eyes, and she seemed a different, more ethereal, slightly frightening person.
Irene, in years the youngest, was a harder nut to crack, and men thought her handsome rather than pretty, as dangerous as alluring. The story went that she had fled her homeland after knifing a traveling preacher for whom she had been shilling. She often imagined returning to New York on the arm of one of the crowned heads she had seen in the rotogravure. In her copy-book, she had already designed an Adler coat of arms–an American eagle, beak deep in the side of a screaming naked Prometheus. A foolish fellow who stepped out with her tended to find some unknown Apache had lifted their note-case, snuff-box, cuff-links and watch.

  “It is a matter of a man and his wife which has been brought before us,” announced Erik. “The man of some distinction, the woman an unknown.”

  The Persian undid the ribbon on a large wallet, and slid out clippings from the popular press, a wedding brochure, photographic plates and other documents. These were passed among the girls.

  Some excitement was expressed at a reproduced portrait of a handsome fellow in the uniform of a Brigadier of the armies of the late Emperor Napoleon I. There was cooing among the doves, of admiration for a curly moustaches and upright saber. With a touch of malice, the Persian handed over a more recent likeness, in which the golden boy was all but unrecognizable. These days, the soldier was an enormous, shaggy-browed, weathered hulk, a pudding of flesh decorated with innumerable medals.

  “You recognize Etienne Gerard, retired Grand Maréchal of France, still reckoned one of our most influential citizens,” said Erik. “No one is as canny as he when it comes to badgering the right politician to change a procurement policy or effect a strategy of preparedness.”

 

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