Masque

by Bethany Pope

  Your Sincere Friend,

  Christine Daaé

  You will never know what joy I felt when I read those words. She was glad to see me! She wanted to renew our ‘acquaintanceship’, she remembered me with joy!

  The terrors of the night were blown away in an instant. I sat up in bed with a whoop of mad joy, tore my nightdress free, tearing the buttons and forgetting the presence of the uniformed maid (who gasped in her shock). I dressed in a hurry. Suddenly, I knew exactly what I must do. Christine was my own, and soon I would be with her.

  I had a train timetable in the top drawer of my desk, I glanced at it, laughing. A train to Brittany departed in two hours. I would make it if I hurried.

  6.

  After my rushed breakfast, I hurried through a palaver with Philippe as I half-explained my destination. He kept me with him longer than was either comfortable or strictly necessary, out of some misplaced sense of brotherly camaraderie.

  ‘An assignation with a lady! Of course you cannot keep her waiting, lad.’ He smiled warmly up at me, comfortable in bed. A small white hand emerged from a lump in the thick coverlet, stroked his greying stubble. He batted the birdlike fingers back out of sight, as though I had not noticed.

  My brother leaned out through the heavy drapes, spilling his expanding gut over the edge of the mattress as he rifled the drawers of his bedside table. I should have been content to leave a note.

  ‘Ah, here we are.’ His grin was wide and condescending as he handed me his second best purse, heavy with gold. ‘Show her a good time, boy. Travel safe.’

  I bit back my impatience (imagine the nerve of it! He acted exactly as though I were a child seeking an allowance!) and forced a thankful smile. I left him there, with his ‘lady’. I assume he was able to amuse himself. His bed was occupying, and occupied, enough.

  By the time I flagged down a cab (I was unwilling to wait for Alphonse to ready Philippe’s personal rig) I was in a fluster of anxiety. I knew that Christine would not be in Brittany long. There were other performances later in the week and as the leading lady she would have to sing. I calmed myself with the thought that a trip to the coast took many hours and there were not many trains. She would remain there one night, at least. She wanted to arrange a mass for her father (an act that filled me with joy: a dutiful daughter will make a dutiful wife!) and such things take time. Most villages only have one morning service. Probably she was seated, right at this moment, in the priest’s office, paying the appropriate fee and filling in the paperwork.

  Or else she was kneeling, right now, above her father’s sunken grave. I wondered, would there be a gravestone or would he have to lie content beneath a wooden cross? He was poor in life, but his progeny had been adopted by a Countess. Christine would inherit a title, in time.

  I thanked God for the Countess, for taking Christine into her family, an act that made this courtship possible. But then who could fail to love a girl as perfect as she was?

  I glanced out of the window, saw the streets, the city’s intestines, fall fast behind me. I saw, like a dream, a ragged man on the cobbles reach out to a passing woman in ‘respectable’ dress. She might have been a baker’s wife. I could not tell if her hands were gloved with cloth or grains of flour. The man, a very ugly specimen of the lower classes, had a goitre on his cheek the size of a hen’s egg. I saw, in an instant, the way he grabbed her purse, snapping the silver-tone chain of her chatelaine.

  I thought of signalling the driver to stop, but then remembered the train, and the invisible rival who would steal my treasure, and let my hand drop. Right now, for me and my future happiness, every second counted.

  Thirty minutes later we arrived at the station. I had missed the early train by a full five minutes. I would have to wait for the evening departure and travel at night. Luckily, there was a cafe at the station. I bought a coffee, brandy-spiked, a roll with ham, and sat down at the table to eat, smoke, and read the daily newspaper.

  Carmen had been reviewed. The critic did not care for the opera, he thought it was ‘common’, but I blushed with pride to see three full paragraphs dedicated to the glory of Christine.

  CHRISTINE

  7.

  I sang my first leading role in spring, a début by Bizet that I loved from my first glance at the score. That composer did something wonderful with folk music, took the simple-seeming tunes and reels of the so-called ‘common folk’ and brought them, blooming, into complex art. I hadn’t heard anything like it since those long-ago days when my father improvised with Nordic farm melodies, his genius shining from him, a heavenly light, as I danced on the dunes, joining my voice to the pure tone of his famous golden violin.

  As for my role, this Carmen, I loved and hated her. She was passionate, beautiful, but more selfish than anyone that I had ever met, insufferable in foolishness. I hated how she squandered the love that she was lucky enough to get. And yet, when I became her on the stage, when I wore her skin, everything that confused me about her character suddenly made sense. The Gypsy took over. My flesh, my face, was simply the mask she wore, my voice the instrument she sang through. I loved her, all of her, her strengths, her flaws, as I pranced bare-toed on that swept wooden stage.

  I never forgot that I owed this chance to my master. He trained, was still training, my developing voice, and more than that, he acted as my invisible manager, arranging my roles. I was supposed to play the smaller part of Carmen’s friend who sings six bars in act three. It is a good role, for a beginner, one that a singer of my status should be glad for.

  La Carlotta was supposed to sing the leading part (and never mind that she was twenty years too old for it – no one could tell from the stage. Her face was smooth beneath the make-up) but three days before the curtain went up, in the middle of a dress rehearsals, her voice suddenly vanished. She had just taken a sip from a carafe of water, fanning her tremendous, glistening bosom with her handkerchief and in the middle of telling a filthy joke to the dresser who was working hard to keep those fatty glories decently contained, her voice was extinguished, mid-sentence. Poof. It went out like a candle.

  She could no longer sing. She could not even croak.

  Of course, it was a disaster. Andre and Firmin ran around like headless hens, squawking about cancelling the show, lamenting all those refunds when Meg, dear little girl, stepped forward and lisped, ‘Messieurs, messieurs, there is no need to fear! Christine Daaé can sing it.’

  I have no idea how she knew. Perhaps she heard me rehearsing the lead role with my master, locked in my room.

  They laughed at first, nervously. Firmin twirled the rim of his fine beaver hat, smudging the nap with his fat fingers and said, ‘It’s true that she can sing, she is a wonderful chorus girl, but she is so inexperienced and even a diva would be hard pressed to learn such a role with only three days’ notice.’ He spoke to the room, as though I couldn’t hear him.

  I stepped forward, feeling invisible eyes on the small of my back, pushing me into the light. ‘I can sing it, sir. My teacher has taught me the whole score. Why, I could sing the role of toreador, if you wanted!’

  And sing I did, before either manager could ask me to reveal the identity of my teacher. The Habanera poured, like wine, from my mouth.

  That evening, after the curtain went down and the tumult died, applause echoing in my ears like the memory of triumph, I returned to my dressing room. I was expecting a letter from my master.

  I was not disappointed. He sent a sealed note, along with a bouquet of flowers, roses, blood red. I could hear him singing, somewhere. He was well pleased with me, and in such moods this was how he often chose to show it; an erudite letter, a small, touching gift, and a childish folk song cheerfully sung through the light fixtures. In such moments, I loved him more than I ever thought it was possible to love anyone but my father.

  I had just cracked the seal, splitting his signature lyre down the centre, when I was interrupted by a knock at the door. The singing stopped, his sweet voice cut out immedi
ately, completely as a candle snuffed.

  It was the boy, the young Comte. I remembered him well, and in that instant I was happy enough to see him, but I was not ready for visitors. I needed to think.

  I said no to dining with him. He took it as ‘yes’. I don’t think that boy ever heard a word I said. In any case, as soon as he had gone I knew that with him in town I would not be free to take the time I needed to perfect my role and prepare for the next one. I made a fast decision then, a plan that I spoke aloud to the walls (I knew my master was near, though still silent. It seemed quite natural to speak into nothing and know that I was heard) and I wrote a note to the Comte to give to Madame Giry who would discover where he lived, and gathered my things. I felt terrible, you see, for being so rude. I should have known by then not to expect empathy from an audience member. The public knows nothing of post-performance exhaustion.

  I had three days to rest and I knew that it would be best to spend them with my father. He had not left my mind since rehearsals began.

  I would have to return by Saturday morning, the seamstresses had done their best reducing La Carlotta’s voluminous costume, but it still required a bit of fine-tuning before the weekend shows. Three days would be enough to get to Brittany and arrange a memorial mass, assuming I caught the midnight train to the coast, which I would if I hurried.

  I packed in a flurry, filling a small valise with money-purse, my good copy of Faust (I left the other on the table, fouled by last-minute rewrites meant to accommodate Carlotta’s slightly deeper voice), and clothes. I brought the flowers and thought I’d packed the letter too, but I must have forgotten it. Oh well, I dismissed it, words are not milk. They keep perfectly well.

  I fell asleep in my second-class carriage, my cloak drawn round me like a coverlet, my head propped on the window pane. When I woke, I saw the coast.

  8.

  The village hadn’t altered much in the five years since the funeral. Father and I had lived with the Countess in her Paris home where he received the best care possible given his disease, not that it did him any good. Right before his death he asked her for two boons, both of which she granted. The first was that, after his body was waked and the flesh had grown cold, he be retuned here for burial. It was the sight of his greatest happiness, I was glad that she allowed him that.

  He lies here now, in the churchyard, the buried coffin has long-since collapsed; the earth hummock has sunk in on itself like Little Meg’s empty cheeks. But when I checked, on my way in to speak with the priest about the service, I saw the old-style Celtic cross I’d ordered. I stooped before it, touched the sharp incision that formed his name. Granite seems to hold its edge forever. I am glad that I won our argument. The white marble the Countess wanted would be worn already. Beautiful things never seem to last long exposed to elements on earth. I laid my flowers down, the roses my singing master gave me. They were startling on the grassy grave, too red, too passionate a gift for a father from his girl, but I thought that they were appropriate, too, in a way. A gift from one father to another. It was, for me, a means of joining both the spirits that I sang for.

  The Countess had also granted the second boon that Father asked her. She’d adopted me as her daughter, though she hesitated at first, for longer than I then found proper. Now that I am grown I understand her hesitation much more fully than I did, although I had an inkling even then. The variety of love she felt for me must have made the action seem incestuous to her. It was easier for her to sign the paper once I made it clear to her, as kindly as I could, that though I loved her truly, I could not reciprocate in the manner she desired. She wept a little when I told her this, her clear cheeks became mottled as chicken skin: few north-toned beauties are lovely in sorrow. Still, she came through in the end, and we grew closer, until we were nearly like sisters.

  As far as I know, she was never jealous of the love I received from other sources. Still, I never could get used to calling her ‘Mother’, and in truth she seemed so relieved at this omission that it seemed to make our relationship far more comfortable than it had been before.

  I entered the ancient stone church through the side door, passing the netted pyramid of exhumed skulls that flanked the wall, dried bones waiting to be rehomed in the ossuary. This church was new before the battle of Hastings. The inside seemed very rough compared to the splendours being unveiled in Paris. I thought it unlikely that anyone would attempt to apply the new trend of ‘refurbishment’ in such a backwater, and I was very glad. In the city architects were knocking down the crude, blackened rood screens in even the smallest parish churches and replacing the rough, column-like saints with more modern replacements, statues like the ones draped all over the Opera House. Do not misunderstand me. I loved those wonderful odes to the delights of the flesh, but in their proper place. The spirit is a harder thing, more granite than marble, less lovely than we’d like to think, but more enduring than the earth.

  The altar was a bare stone slab, covered over with clumsy bundles of foliage spread out like an offering. The priest, a spare old man in a plain brown robe (it looked like it was made of burlap), was reaching up with the plate and wooden chalice, stretching to place them back in the cabinet which held the sacred bread and wine. He shut the door, painted with a scene of the Last Supper in tempera, turned and smiled at me broadly, so that every blackened tooth showed.

  ‘Why, if it isn’t Miss … Daaé?’ He rushed forward, tottering, his thick white hair shining in the sunlight let in through clear windows.

  ‘Why yes! You remember me!’ I remembered his kindness to me, after the service, but that was years ago.

  ‘Of course, my dear. It isn’t often that piety and beauty meet, I note it when it does.’ He patted my hand like an uncle, ‘Besides, you sang so sweetly at the burial that I have never forgotten it.’

  After such a greeting it was an easy joy to arrange the memorial service. He would sing it the next morning.

  ‘No, no, my dear. My Lord in Rome would be loath to hear it, but I take no payment for masses given in mercy. Weddings either (I can get away with it, there are not many). I have to charge for funerals, unfortunately. We have them pretty frequently, and my Cardinal does check.’ He laughed, escorting me down the aisle like a bride in reverse, ‘If you are so moved, however, I will say that we have a lot of poor in the area. If you are determined to part with some pennies might I suggest giving them to Madame Guilfont? She is a widow, you know, with seven children. Her husband had an enormous appetite for life, and love – until he suddenly didn’t. Here, I will give you her address.’

  The only paper I had in my basket was the script for Faust. He scrawled on the back. I was happy to see that the cottage was very close to my hotel. I would call, on my way past. She would get more gold than coppers.

  9.

  I spent the night at the inn in relative comfort. I never used to be so inclined towards luxury, but my years with the Countess have softened me so much that the rustic little room with the peasant-style, rope-sprung mattress and clay washbasin (there was no mirror) seemed quaint, if not totally uncomfortable. The bed was stuffed with feathers and the linens were clean, so I enjoyed my sleep and rose with the dawn, to the sound of the stable boy’s wood chopping and the rooster’s loud crow.

  I had a hand-sized looking glass in my valise and I set it on the highboy dresser. The little mirror leaned against the wall and showed me enough of myself to reassure me that my hair had not become too dishevelled as I slept. At a little after six-thirty, the maid knocked with the breakfast I requested: a hot roll and a steaming mug of coffee. She left the tray precariously balanced on the mattress. I knew that since I meant to have communion during the mass I should defer satisfying my stomach, but I was so anxious about maintaining my strength for my performances that I did not want to risk wrecking my singing by altering any more of my schedule than was necessary.

  ‘Oh, Madame?’ The girl was young for this work, eleven or twelve, dressed in a frock that began its life as
a flour sack. Perhaps she was the daughter of my host. She was a thin little thing and could have used some feeding up.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘There is a Gentleman here.’ She blushed, quite prettily. ‘A young and handsome one, with a nice little moustache. He arrived late last night and asked about you. He wanted to know if you were going to church. If so, he wanted to know when you would be leaving and he offered me a bar of chocolate and a five-franc note if I will tell him so.’

  Raoul. The little Comte. Did he not read the letter I sent him? I fumed, internally, carefully maintaining a light-hearted mask. Of course he read the letter. That is how he knew where I was. But then, if he read it, why did he not take me at my word that I wanted to be alone? I answered myself: because when you speak he hears only what he wishes to. He has always been like this; it is a habit from childhood.

  Think, Christine, think. You have to decide what to do. You know that he is petulant. You know that he is spoiled, and that his brother loves him dearly. His brother is your boss. If you rebuff his advances too harshly, this boy could ruin your career just as it is launching.

  The girl was staring at me, her big brown eyes open wide, waiting for a response. Suddenly, one came. It made its way to my lips as though in answer to an unspoken prayer. I must feign pleasure, play the game with him until I could return to the city and ask advice from my master. The ‘Opera Ghost’, as the dancing girls call him, was wise (I thought) in the ways of the world. I said, ‘Of course, dear. The Comte. I know him very well.’

  I smiled at her, allowed my grin to widen as her body relaxed. ‘Go wake him now. Tell him that the service begins at eight o’clock, and that if he should wish to walk me there I will be waiting by the front gate at a quarter to the hour.’

  The girl took my coin in exchange for a country attempt at a curtsey and clattered out into the hall in her antique wooden shoes.