The Phantom of the Opera
other, examining the priming of his pistols. "And what a duel!"
Handing one of the pistols to Raoul, he added, "In this duel, we shall
be two to one; but you must be prepared for everything, for we shall be
fighting the most terrible adversary that you can imagine. But you
love Christine Daae, do you not?"
"I worship the ground she stands on! But you, sir, who do not love
her, tell me why I find you ready to risk your life for her! You must
certainly hate Erik!"
"No, sir," said the Persian sadly, "I do not hate him. If I hated him,
he would long ago have ceased doing harm."
"Has he done you harm?"
"I have forgiven him the harm which he has done me."
"I do not understand you. You treat him as a monster, you speak of his
crime, he has done you harm and I find in you the same inexplicable
pity that drove me to despair when I saw it in Christine!"
The Persian did not reply. He fetched a stool and set it against the
wall facing the great mirror that filled the whole of the wall-space
opposite. Then he climbed on the stool and, with his nose to the
wallpaper, seemed to be looking for something.
"Ah," he said, after a long search, "I have it!" And, raising his
finger above his head, he pressed against a corner in the pattern of
the paper. Then he turned round and jumped off the stool:
"In half a minute," he said, "he shall be ON HIS ROAD!" and crossing
the whole of the dressing-room he felt the great mirror.
"No, it is not yielding yet," he muttered.
"Oh, are we going out by the mirror?" asked Raoul. "Like Christine
Daae."
"So you knew that Christine Daae went out by that mirror?"
"She did so before my eyes, sir! I was hidden behind the curtain of
the inner room and I saw her vanish not by the glass, but in the glass!"
"And what did you do?"
"I thought it was an aberration of my senses, a mad dream.
"Or some new fancy of the ghost's!" chuckled the Persian. "Ah, M. de
Chagny," he continued, still with his hand on the mirror, "would that
we had to do with a ghost! We could then leave our pistols in their
case ... Put down your hat, please ... there ... and now cover your
shirt-front as much as you can with your coat ... as I am doing ...
Bring the lapels forward ... turn up the collar ... We must make
ourselves as invisible as possible."
Bearing against the mirror, after a short silence, he said:
"It takes some time to release the counterbalance, when you press on
the spring from the inside of the room. It is different when you are
behind the wall and can act directly on the counterbalance. Then the
mirror turns at once and is moved with incredible rapidity."
"What counterbalance?" asked Raoul.
"Why, the counterbalance that lifts the whole of this wall on to its
pivot. You surely don't expect it to move of itself, by enchantment!
If you watch, you will see the mirror first rise an inch or two and
then shift an inch or two from left to right. It will then be on a
pivot and will swing round."
"It's not turning!" said Raoul impatiently.
"Oh, wait! You have time enough to be impatient, sir! The mechanism
has obviously become rusty, or else the spring isn't working... Unless
it is something else," added the Persian, anxiously.
"What?"
"He may simply have cut the cord of the counterbalance and blocked the
whole apparatus."
"Why should he? He does not know that we are coming this way!"
"I dare say he suspects it, for he knows that I understand the system."
"It's not turning! ... And Christine, sir, Christine?"
The Persian said coldly:
"We shall do all that it is humanly possible to do! ... But he may stop
us at the first step! ... He commands the walls, the doors and the
trapdoors. In my country, he was known by a name which means the
'trap-door lover.'"
"But why do these walls obey him alone? He did not build them!"
"Yes, sir, that is just what he did!"
Raoul looked at him in amazement; but the Persian made a sign to him to
be silent and pointed to the glass ... There was a sort of shivering
reflection. Their image was troubled as in a rippling sheet of water
and then all became stationary again.
"You see, sir, that it is not turning! Let us take another road!"
"To-night, there is no other!" declared the Persian, in a singularly
mournful voice. "And now, look out! And be ready to fire."
He himself raised his pistol opposite the glass. Raoul imitated his
movement. With his free arm, the Persian drew the young man to his
chest and, suddenly, the mirror turned, in a blinding daze of
cross-lights: it turned like one of those revolving doors which have
lately been fixed to the entrances of most restaurants, it turned,
carrying Raoul and the Persian with it and suddenly hurling them from
the full light into the deepest darkness.
Chapter XX In the Cellars of the Opera
"Your hand high, ready to fire!" repeated Raoul's companion quickly.
The wall, behind them, having completed the circle which it described
upon itself, closed again; and the two men stood motionless for a
moment, holding their breath.
At last, the Persian decided to make a movement; and Raoul heard him
slip on his knees and feel for something in the dark with his groping
hands. Suddenly, the darkness was made visible by a small dark lantern
and Raoul instinctively stepped backward as though to escape the
scrutiny of a secret enemy. But he soon perceived that the light
belonged to the Persian, whose movements he was closely observing. The
little red disk was turned in every direction and Raoul saw that the
floor, the walls and the ceiling were all formed of planking. It must
have been the ordinary road taken by Erik to reach Christine's
dressing-room and impose upon her innocence. And Raoul, remembering
the Persian's remark, thought that it had been mysteriously constructed
by the ghost himself. Later, he learned that Erik had found, all
prepared for him, a secret passage, long known to himself alone and
contrived at the time of the Paris Commune to allow the jailers to
convey their prisoners straight to the dungeons that had been
constructed for them in the cellars; for the Federates had occupied the
opera-house immediately after the eighteenth of March and had made a
starting-place right at the top for their Mongolfier balloons, which
carried their incendiary proclamations to the departments, and a state
prison right at the bottom.
The Persian went on his knees and put his lantern on the ground. He
seemed to be working at the floor; and suddenly he turned off his
light. Then Raoul heard a faint click and saw a very pale luminous
square in the floor of the passage. It was as though a window had
opened on the Opera cellars, which were still lit. Raoul no longer saw
the Persian, but he suddenly felt him by his side and heard him whisper:
"Follow me and do all that I do."
Raoul turned to the luminous aperture. Then he saw the Persian, who
was still on his knees, hang by his hands from the rim of the opening,
with his pistol between his teeth, and slide into the cellar below.
Curiously enough, the viscount had absolute confidence in the Persian,
though he knew nothing about him. His emotion when speaking of the
"monster" struck him as sincere; and, if the Persian had cherished any
sinister designs against him, he would not have armed him with his own
hands. Besides, Raoul must reach Christine at all costs. He therefore
went on his knees also and hung from the trap with both hands.
"Let go!" said a voice.
And he dropped into the arms of the Persian, who told him to lie down
flat, closed the trap-door above him and crouched down beside him.
Raoul tried to ask a question, but the Persian's hand was on his mouth
and he heard a voice which he recognized as that of the commissary of
police.
Raoul and the Persian were completely hidden behind a wooden partition.
Near them, a small staircase led to a little room in which the
commissary appeared to be walking up and down, asking questions. The
faint light was just enough to enable Raoul to distinguish the shape of
things around him. And he could not restrain a dull cry: there were
three corpses there.
The first lay on the narrow landing of the little staircase; the two
others had rolled to the bottom of the staircase. Raoul could have
touched one of the two poor wretches by passing his fingers through the
partition.
"Silence!" whispered the Persian.
He too had seen the bodies and he gave one word in explanation:
"HE!"
The commissary's voice was now heard more distinctly. He was asking
for information about the system of lighting, which the stage-manager
supplied. The commissary therefore must be in the "organ" or its
immediate neighborhood.
Contrary to what one might think, especially in connection with an
opera-house, the "organ" is not a musical instrument. At that time,
electricity was employed only for a very few scenic effects and for the
bells. The immense building and the stage itself were still lit by
gas; hydrogen was used to regulate and modify the lighting of a scene;
and this was done by means of a special apparatus which, because of the
multiplicity of its pipes, was known as the "organ." A box beside the
prompter's box was reserved for the chief gas-man, who from there gave
his orders to his assistants and saw that they were executed. Mauclair
stayed in this box during all the performances.
But now Mauclair was not in his box and his assistants not in their
places.
"Mauclair! Mauclair!"
The stage-manager's voice echoed through the cellars. But Mauclair did
not reply.
I have said that a door opened on a little staircase that led to the
second cellar. The commissary pushed it, but it resisted.
"I say," he said to the stage-manager, "I can't open this door: is it
always so difficult?"
The stage-manager forced it open with his shoulder. He saw that, at
the same time, he was pushing a human body and he could not keep back
an exclamation, for he recognized the body at once:
"Mauclair! Poor devil! He is dead!"
But Mr. Commissary Mifroid, whom nothing surprised, was stooping over
that big body.
"No," he said, "he is dead-drunk, which is not quite the same thing."
"It's the first time, if so," said the stage-manager
"Then some one has given him a narcotic. That is quite possible."
Mifroid went down a few steps and said:
"Look!"
By the light of a little red lantern, at the foot of the stairs, they
saw two other bodies. The stage-manager recognized Mauclair's
assistants. Mifroid went down and listened to their breathing.
"They are sound asleep," he said. "Very curious business! Some person
unknown must have interfered with the gas-man and his staff ... and
that person unknown was obviously working on behalf of the kidnapper
... But what a funny idea to kidnap a performer on the stage! ... Send
for the doctor of the theater, please." And Mifroid repeated, "Curious,
decidedly curious business!"
Then he turned to the little room, addressing the people whom Raoul and
the Persian were unable to see from where they lay.
"What do you say to all this, gentlemen? You are the only ones who
have not given your views. And yet you must have an opinion of some
sort."
Thereupon, Raoul and the Persian saw the startled faces of the joint
managers appear above the landing--and they heard Moncharmin's excited
voice:
"There are things happening here, Mr. Commissary, which we are unable
to explain."
And the two faces disappeared.
"Thank you for the information, gentlemen," said Mifroid, with a jeer.
But the stage-manager, holding his chin in the hollow of his right
hand, which is the attitude of profound thought, said:
"It is not the first time that Mauclair has fallen asleep in the