‘With these minor cavils, I remain, sir, yours etc.
‘Signed: P. of the Opera.’
This letter was accompanied by a cutting from the Revue théâtrale which carried these words: ‘P. of the O.: R. and M. have behaved unforgivably. We explained the situation and made sure they received a copy of your memorandum of conditions. Respects.’
M. Richard was still reading when his office door opened and Armand Moncharmin walked in holding a letter identical to the one he had received. They looked at each other then burst out laughing.
‘They’re still plodding on with the same joke,’ said M. Richard, ‘but it’s stopped being funny.’
‘What does it mean?’ asked M. Moncharmin. ‘Do they think that just because they used to be Directors of the Opera we’re going to offer them a free box for life?’
They had absolutely no doubt that the letter sent to both of them was the joint effort of their predecessors’ warped sense of humour.
‘I’m in no mood to be played for a fool any more!’ growled Firmin Richard.
‘There’s no harm in it!’ said M. Moncharmin.
‘I’ll tell you what they’re after! A box for tonight!’
M. Richard told his secretary to send tickets for Box 5 to Messrs Debienne and Poligny if it hadn’t been taken.
It hadn’t. The tickets were sent off at once. M. Debienne lived on the corner of the Rue Scribe and the Boulevard des Capucines and M. Poligny in the Rue Auber. Both letters sent by the ‘P. of the Opera’ had been franked at the post office in the Boulevard des Capucines. It was Moncharmin who pointed this out as he examined the envelopes.
‘There! I knew it!’ said Richard.*
They shrugged and said they were sorry that two men old enough to know better like Debienne and Poligny were still playing childish games.
‘Also, they could have been a bit more polite!’ said Moncharmin. ‘Did you notice how rude they were about the way we’ve dealt with La Carlotta, La Sorelli and the little Jammes girl?’
‘Bah, they’re just green with envy, old man!… And to think they went to the expense of sending that letter to the Revue théâtrale!… Haven’t they got anything better to do?’
‘Incidentally,’ Moncharmin went on, ‘they seem to be very interested in young Christine Daaé…’
‘You know as well as I do that there’s not a blot on her reputation!’ replied Richard.
‘A reputation can cover a multiplicity of sins,’ said Moncharmin. ‘Take me. I have a reputation for knowing all about music, but in fact I can’t tell the difference between the bass and treble clefs!’
‘Don’t worry. No one’s ever said that of you,’ said Richard.
Then he sent for a porter and told him to let in the artists who had been pacing around the grand lobby of the administrative wing for a couple of hours, waiting for the door to the Directors’ office to open. Behind it fame and fortune awaited them—or the axe.
The rest of the day was spent arguing, negotiating, signing or cancelling contracts. So you will readily believe that, come the evening—the evening of 25 January—both Directors, exhausted by a difficult day of angry confrontations, plotting, propositions, threats and protestations of love or hate, went to bed early, without being curious enough even to call in at Box 5 to see whether Messrs Debienne and Poligny were enjoying the performance. No one at the Opera had been idle since the old Directors had left, and M. Richard had gone ahead with urgent works without interrupting the programme of performances.
Next morning, Richard and Moncharmin each found, in their correspondence, a thank-you card from the Phantom:
‘Dear Director,
‘Many thanks. Very pleasant evening. Daaé exquisite. Choruses need attention. La Carlotta, a great but characterless voice. Will be in touch soon regarding the 240,000 francs—to be precise, 233,424 francs and 70 centimes: Debienne and Poligny remitted the 6,575 francs 30 for the first two days of this year’s payment. Their contracts ended on the 10th.
‘Regards
‘P. of the O.’
In the same post was a note from Messrs Debienne and Poligny:
‘Gentlemen,
‘Thank you for your kind gesture but you will understand that the prospect of listening to Faust again, though tempting to former Directors of the Opera House, can in no way make us forget that we have no right to occupy Box 5 on the grand tier. It is reserved exclusively for the person we discussed with you when we held our final reading of the Memorandum of Conditions, and especially of the last paragraph of Clause 63.
‘We remain, etc.’
‘Hell’s teeth, that pair of jokers are beginning to test my patience!’ snarled Firmin Richard, snatching the letter from Debienne and Poligny.
That night, tickets were sold for Box 5.
When they arrived in their office the next morning, Richard and Moncharmin found the house security officer’s report on an incident which had occurred the previous evening in Box 5 on the grand tier. This is the relevant section of the report. It is brief.
‘Earlier this evening,’ wrote the security officer, who had compiled his report the night before, ‘I was forced to send for a constable to clear Box 5 on two separate occasions, once at the start and again in the middle of Act 2. The occupants, who arrived at the beginning of the second act, were causing a disturbance with their loud laughter and ribald comments. Patrons sitting nearby told them to hush and the whole audience was beginning to protest when the box-attendant came to fetch me. I went into the box in question and said what needed to be said. The patrons concerned did not seem to be in full control of themselves and responded by saying very stupid things. I warned them that if they made further trouble, I would be forced to clear the box. I was hardly through the door when I heard them laughing again and fresh protests from the house. I returned with a constable who ordered them to leave. Still laughing, they said they would not go unless they got their money back. Finally they calmed down and I allowed them to return to their box. They immediately started carrying on again and this time I had them ejected for good.’
‘Send for the security man,’ Richard told his secretary who had already read the report and marked passages in blue pencil.
Their secretary was M. Rémy, twenty-four years of age, thin moustache, elegant, dignified, in formal dress (in those days obligatory frock-coat during working hours), intelligent and intimidated by M. Richard, on a salary of 2,400 a year paid out of the Director’s own pocket. His duties were to go through the daily papers, deal with letters, handle the allocation of boxes and complimentary tickets, fix appointments, chat pleasantly to those waiting to see the Director, visit artists who fell ill, find understudies, correspond with departmental managers, but above all he was the guardian of the Director’s portal. He could be dismissed without compensation, sacked without notice, for he was not on the official payroll. M. Rémy, who had already sent for the house security officer, had him shown in.
He entered, looking rather nervous.
‘Tell us what happened,’ said Richard curtly.
The man began a stuttering account and referred to his report.
‘But what on earth were those people laughing at?’ asked Moncharmin.
‘They’d probably had a good dinner, sir, and seemed more interested in larking about than listening to good music. I mean, they’d hardly set foot in the box when out they came shouting for the attendant. She asked what was up. They tell her: “Look, in the box, there’s nobody inside, right?”—“Right,” says the attendant.—“Well,’ says they, “when we went in, we heard this voice telling us ‘this box is taken’.”’
Moncharmin could not look at Richard without smiling, but Richard was not smiling. In his time, he had played enough practical jokes himself not to detect in the security officer’s story which he told so artlessly the hallmark of one of those hoaxes which start by amusing and end by infuriating their targets.
To get on the right side of M. Moncharmin who was smiling, the
man thought he should smile too. It was a bad mistake! He was immediately withered by a blistering glare from M. Richard, and immediately set about rearranging his face to show utter dismay.
‘Let’s be clear,’ thundered the fearsome Richard. ‘When these people arrived there was no one in the box? Correct?’
‘Nobody, sir, nobody! Nobody in the box to the right of them, nobody in the box on the left, not a soul, I swear! It’s the honest truth, sir! And it proves it was all some sort of stunt!’
‘And the attendant. What did she have to say?’
‘Oh, it was obvious to her. She reckoned it was the Phantom of the Opera! And that’s that!’
And the man sniggered. But quickly he realized sniggering was another mistake, for the words ‘she reckoned it was the Phantom of the Opera’ were hardly out of his mouth when M. Richard’s face which had been dark and grim suddenly turned furious.
‘Get me the attendant!’ he barked the order… ‘Now! Bring her to me here! And I want everybody else outside!’
The security officer tried to protest but Richard shut him up with a thunderous ‘Silence!’ Then just as the lips of the wretched man seemed closed for ever, the Director ordered him to open them again.
‘Who or what is this Phantom of the Opera?’ he finally brought himself to growl.
By this time the officer was incapable of speech. He managed to convey by a desperate dumb-show that he knew nothing and moreover didn’t want to know.
‘Have you seen the Phantom of the Opera?’
With a vigorous shake of the head, the man denied that he’d ever seen him.
‘Pity!’ snapped M. Richard frostily.
The man opened his eyes wide, so wide they seemed about to jump out of their sockets, and asked why the Director had uttered that ominous: ‘Pity!’
‘Because I’m going to send everyone who hasn’t seen him packing!’ said the Director. ‘Since he seems to be everywhere, it’s very odd that everybody keeps telling me they haven’t seen him anywhere. I like people who do their jobs conscientiously!’
CHAPTER 5
Box 5 (Continued)
HAVING said this, M. Richard paid no further attention to the security officer and proceeded to settle a number of business matters with his general Administrator who had just come into the office. The security man thought he could slip away quietly, very quietly, tremendously quietly, please God!… and, backing ever so quietly, had got as far as the door when M. Richard, noticing what he was up to, rooted him to the spot with an almighty bellow: ‘Stay where you are!’
M. Rémy had sent for someone to fetch the box-attendant who also worked as concierge to a house in the Rue de Provence, just around the corner from the Opera. It was not long before she came.
‘What’s your name?’
‘Madame Giry. But you know me, sir. I’m Meg Giry’s mother, little Meg…’
This was said in a plain-spoken, sober voice which briefly took M. Richard aback for a moment. He stared at Mme Giry in her faded shawl, scuffed shoes, old taffeta dress and dusty-black bonnet. It was quite obvious from the way he looked at her that he neither knew nor recalled ever having heard of Mme Giry, nor Mlle Meg Giry, nor even little Meg! But so high did Mme Giry stand in her own regard as the famous box-attendant (I do believe it was her name that gave rise to the word ‘giry’ much used in backstage jargon. For example: when one singer or dancer tells another off for spreading gossip and tittle-tattle, she says ‘that’s all giry-talk’*) that, as we were saying, she thought everybody knew her.
‘Never heard of you or her!’ the Director said after a moment, ‘but no matter, Mme Giry. I still want you to tell me what precisely happened last night to make you and the security man send for a constable.’
‘Now that, sir, is exackly wot I was wanting to talk to you about, so’s you won’t have the same bother as happened to M. Debienne and M. Poligny… They didn’t want to listen to me neither, at the start…’
‘I’m not asking you about that. I’m asking you about what happened here last night!’
Mme Giry’s face turned purple with indignation. No one had ever spoken to her like this before. She got up as if she were about to leave, gathering the folds of her skirt and making the feathers in her dusty-black hat quiver haughtily. Then changing her mind, she sat down again and said in a superior voice:
‘What happened was that someone went and upset the Phantom!’
At this, seeing that Richard was about to lose his temper, Moncharmin intervened and took over questioning Mme Giry who, it turned out, found it perfectly natural that a disembodied voice should solemnly declare that there was someone in a box that was empty. She could not explain the phenomenon, which was not new to her, other than by attributing it to the Phantom. No one could see this Phantom in the box, but they’d all heard him. She’d often heard him, and they could take her word for it, because she never told fibs. They could ask M. Debienne and M. Poligny and anybody that knew her, also M. Isidore Saack who’d had a leg broken by the Phantom.
‘Hold on,’ broke in M. Moncharmin. ‘The Phantom broke this Isidore Saack’s leg?’
Mme Giry opened her eyes wide with amazement at such ignorance and in the end agreed to enlighten these two unfortunate innocents. The same thing had happened before, in the days when Messrs Debienne and Poligny were in charge, also in Box 5 and also during a performance of Faust.
Mme Giry coughed, cleared her throat and began. It was as if she was limbering up to sing the entire score of Gounod’s opera.
‘Well now, sir, that night, M. Maniera and his lady wife—they got a jeweller’s shop in the Rue Mogador—were in the front of the box, and their good friend M. Isidore Saack was sitting behind Mme Maniera. Mephistopheles was singing (she began to sing): “Thou who feignest sleep”. Just then M. Maniera hears in his right ear (his lady was on his left) a voice saying: “Aha! Julie’s not pretending to be asleep” (his lady is called Julie). M. Maniera turns to his right to see who had said these words. Nobody there! He scratches his ear and wonders: “Am I dreaming?” Meanwhile Mephistopheles goes on with the next line of the aria… But perhaps I’m boring you gentlemen?’
‘No no! Please go on!’
‘Too kind I’m sure. (Here Mme Giry simpers coyly.) Anyroad, Mephistopheles carries on singing (Mme Giry sings): “Catherine, whom I adore… why deny me, I implore, a sweet and tender kiss?” and at that moment M. Maniera hears, again in his right ear, the same voice saying: “I don’t think Julie would deny Isidore who doth implore a kiss!” He turns sharply, this time to the left, towards his lady and Isidore, and what does he see? Isidore behind him holding his lady’s hand busily kissing it through the little opening near the button of her glove… like this, your honours. (Mme Giry kisses the round place on her own hand left bare by her rough silk glove.) As you can imagine, the next bit didn’t happen on the Q.T.! Biff! Bang! M. Maniera was big and strong just like yourself, M. Richard, and he lands a couple of beauties on Isidore Saack who was soft and wishy-washy like M. Moncharmin here, if he don’t mind me saying so. There was uproar in the auditorium. The audience was shouting: “That’s enough! Stop!… He’ll kill him!” In the end, M. Saack managed to get away.’
‘So the Phantom didn’t actually, personally break his leg?’ asked M. Moncharmin, feeling rather put out that his physique had made such a poor impression on Mme Giry.
‘Oh he broke it all right, sir,’ replied Mme Giry sniffily, for she had understood the implication, ‘bust it clean on the grand staircase, running down helter-skelter, he was! He come down them stairs that fast it’ll be a month of Sundays before the poor man will go up them again!’
‘And was it the Phantom who told you what he’d whispered in M. Maniera’s right ear?’ said prosecuting counsel Moncharmin, with a gravity he imagined was very droll.
‘Oh no, sir! It was M. Maniera hisself. He…’
‘But have you ever spoken to the ghost, my good woman?’
‘Like I’m talking to you
now, sir.’
‘And when he talks to you, what does he say?’
‘Well, he says I’m to fetch him a footstool!’
With these words, so solemnly delivered, Mme Giry’s features turned to marble, the same yellowish, red-veined Pyrenean Sarrancolin marble used for the columns supporting the grand staircase.
This time, Richard burst out laughing again along with Moncharmin and Rémy, the secretary. Having learned by experience, the security officer took good care not to laugh. He leaned against the wall, nervously played with the keys in his pocket and wondered how it would all end. And the more irascible Mme Giry became, the more he was afraid M. Richard would lose his temper again. And now, confronted by the laughter of both Directors, Mme Giry was likely to turn nasty! Really nasty!
‘Instead of laughing at the Phantom,’ she cried indignantly, ‘you’d be better off doing like M. Poligny. He found out hisself, the hard way, without any help!’
‘Found out about what?’ asked Moncharmin who had never enjoyed himself as much.
‘About the Phantom, of course!… I’m telling you! Listen!… (She calms down suddenly, aware of the gravity of the moment.) Listen! I remember it as if it was yesterday. This time, they was performing La Juive.* M. Poligny thought he’d watch it, by hisself, from the Phantom’s box. Mme Krauss was getting an ovation. She’d just sung that aria in Act 2, you know (Mme Giry hums):
‘When I’m near the man I love
I want to live and want to die
Yet though Death brush us with his glove
He shall not part us though we die.’
‘Good! Good! I know it,’ said Moncharmin with a discouraging smile.
But Mme Giry went on humming, while the feather in her dusty-black hat waved in time to:
‘Away! Let’s flee! Here below and in God’s blue sky,
The same fate awaits us two unless we fly!’
The Phantom of the Opera (Oxford World's Classics) Page 8