I raised my grandmother’s jeweled opera glasses to my eye. Charlotte, playing Psyche, appeared on stage and burst into song. Her voice rang out like bells. My heart sank. How to compete with her? She was a magician, enchanting her listeners. They were just notes on a sheet of music and Italian words, but she transmuted them into ambrosia. I felt defeated. I could only imagine the pride Julien felt watching his songbird, listening to her. This couldn’t be a marriage of convenience. He had to be in love with her. Who could listen to her and not be a little in love with her?
In person, Charlotte was lovely, but there was nothing striking about her. There was no exceptional light in her eyes, no fetching tilt to her head, no nuance that turned a woman into a true beauty. But now, listening to her, no one could take his eyes off of her.
No one except for me. Moving the glasses, I scanned the boxes for the one I was looking for. Julien and Charlotte’s father were seated almost opposite to us, both of them riveted to the action onstage.
I watched Julien as he watched Charlotte sing of her longing to see her lover in the light.
Julien did not like to talk about Charlotte, but I’d been able to surmise that her celebrity opened doors for him. In the last two years, he’d built several nightclubs and residences for people in the theatrical world who were more amenable to his avant-garde style than the staid upper-class clientele who typically hired Cingal’s firm. Julien’s reputation had grown because of these commissions. Her star shone on him.
On the stage, Cupid made a dramatic entrance, flying in from above, his iridescent, wide, wondrous wings spread. Along with the rest of the audience, I gasped as this beautiful creature came down to earth to make love to a human who was doomed never to set eyes on him.
It was painful to watch the scene on the stage, impossible not to imagine Julien making love to Charlotte. How did they embrace? What did her kisses taste like? Did he become as aroused as quickly with her or more quickly than with me? What secret touches and tricks did they share?
I was staring at the stage when it happened. Staring at the woman who I was certain came between me and real happiness. My resentment toward her was building. My fury at having to deal with and accept these conventions was growing. So what that Julien had given his word? How could he throw away what we had for her? The opera glasses in my hand warmed, my anger heating them. The gold burned my cheek where the rim rested on my skin. I yanked them away lest they leave a mark on my flesh. The heat they were generating through my gloves was almost intolerable. What was wrong?
In the audience, the theatergoers were murmuring appreciation for what was happening on the stage. What theatrical event was this? Cupid’s wings were shining with a peculiar vermilion and crimson light—what was it?
Suddenly, Cupid began to move in a furious, hysterical way that didn’t fit the part. He was pulling his wings off. They were smoking. The wings were burning.
Charlotte pulled off her mantle. A ring of fire around the hem crept up the garment. The music stopped. For one moment the theater was silent. For that single second the fire held everyone mesmerized, and then the crowd erupted in shouts.
“Fire!”
Panic began to build.
“Fire!”
Beside me Monsieur Garnier took my arm. “Come, Mademoiselle Sandrine. In events like this the panic can be more dangerous than the actual fire. The stagehands are prepared, but the crowd . . . that’s where the real risk is. Quickly as you can . . . I’ll get you to a safe place and then come back and help them.”
I knew he was right, but Julien was in this melee. We had to find him. If Garnier was going to save me, he had to save Julien, too.
“I have a friend here. Can we just find—”
“There’s no time, just come with me. Your grandmother would never forgive me if I didn’t keep you safe.”
On the stage, a line of men passed buckets of water to those closest to the fire, but as they put out one blaze, it seemed another area of the stage burst into flames. The conflagration traveled from fabric to prop, prop to fabric, faster than they could extinguish it.
“You said they’d contain the fire,” I said.
“They will”—but he didn’t sound confident. “No matter what happens, though, you will be safe if you do as I say.”
He pulled me away from the direction of the main staircase and the lobby, the front doors and Julien, and instead toward the back and into a darkened, unadorned hallway.
At the far end, he opened the very last door with a key he pulled from his vest pocket and pointed.
“Three flights down are stone caverns and a lake. Fire cannot work its way through stone. Wait for me. There are candles and matches inside small hollows as you descend. Use them to light your way. Be careful.”
And then he disappeared, shutting the door after him.
I was engulfed by profound darkness. There simply was no light. I tried the door behind me. He’d locked it, or it had self-locked when he’d shut it, I couldn’t open it.
Where was Julien? Had he been hurt in the crush? What if the fire spread before everyone got out? I had only just found him . . . I couldn’t lose him. What if he and Monsieur Cingal had rushed the stage to save Charlotte? What if they were trapped? I could smell the inferno now. The acrid scent filled the air.
I had no choice; the door was locked, and there was no going back. I felt to my right for the niche, found it. Groped for the candle and matches. I found the matches, but instead of a candle, there was only a stub of wax, far too small to light. Whoever had used it last had forgotten to replace it.
There were candles in niches all along the way, Garnier had said. But what if they were all like this one?
Somewhere beyond this door, behind me, I could hear the shouts of the operagoers and stagehands.
I took a deep breath, grabbed hold of the hand railing. How could there be a lake? I vaguely remembered a story about a lake and a frightening phantom who lived below the opera, but that was a legend in a novel.
But if Garnier said it would be safe, it would be. If anyone knew about this place, it would be the man responsible for building it.
At the base of that first flight, I felt around and indeed found a second niche . . . and in it a small candle, this one was big enough to ignite. With an unsteady hand, I struck the match. The flame was so terribly bright after the last few minutes I’d spent in pitch-blackness that I blinked back tears.
With a light, the second staircase was less frightening until I reached the third set of stairs. Greeted with the clammy scent of fungus and an eerie silence punctuated by a slow drip, as steady as a heart beating, I panicked. Everything in front of me was a mystery.
Cautiously, I stepped off the last step, walked forward. In the distance I saw a glimmer of water. I had reached the lake. It was just as Garnier said. A lantern hung from a hook drilled into the stone. Blankets were stacked in a niche in a rock wall.
Garnier had told me to wait for him, and I had every intention of obeying him. Venturing deeper into this underground maze without a guide would be suicidal. There was a very small boat tied up to a stake in the lake. It appeared to be silver and black, but I couldn’t be sure since my candle gave off only a meager beacon. Where would it take me? I was too frightened to find out. Instead I found a rock that could function as a bench and sat. How long would it be before Garnier returned? And what if he didn’t? What if the fire got worse and worse and everyone was—
Becoming alarmed would not help me. I’d brought a small tin of crystallized violets with me and fished inside my reticule to find it. To do so, I had to first take out the opera glasses that I had been holding when the fire broke out.
As I removed them, I noticed something strange.
I had been nowhere near the blaze, and yet the pearls were blackened and soot covered the rubies. A film of it lay over the lenses. As I examined the small binoculars, I saw that the fingertips of my gloves were singed.
Do you understand now?
The echo slid across the lake and was lost in the gloom.
Who had said that? Had Garnier come back so soon? I turned, but no one was there.
I can help you.