Gaston Leroux: The Phantom of the Opera

Chapter 7. Faust and What Followed (continued)

            "Would she but deign to hear me
             And with one smile to cheer me..."

"The little baggage!" growled the count.

And he wondered what she wanted. What she was hoping for. ...She was a virtuous girl, she was said to have no friend, no protector of any sort....That angel from the North must be very artful!

Raoul, behind the curtain of his hands that veiled his boyish tears, thought only of the letter which he received on his return to Paris, where Christine, fleeing from Perros like a thief in the night, had arrived before him:

MY DEAR LITTLE PLAYFELLOW:

You must have the courage not to see me again, not to speak of me again. If you love me just a little, do this for me, for me who will never forget you, my dear Raoul. My life depends upon it. Your life depends upon it. YOUR LITTLE CHRISTINE.

Thunders of applause. Carlotta made her entrance.

           "I wish I could but know who was he
            That addressed me,
            If he was noble, or, at least, what his name is..."

When Margarita had finished singing the ballad of the KING OF THULE, she was loudly cheered and again when she came to the end of the jewel song:

            "Ah, the joy of past compare
             These jewels bright to wear!..."

Thenceforth, certain of herself, certain of her friends in the house, certain of her voice and her success, fearing nothing, Carlotta flung herself into her part without restraint of modesty....She was no longer Margarita, she was Carmen. She was applauded all the more; and her debut with Faust seemed about to bring her a new success, when suddenly...a terrible thing happened.

Faust had knelt on one knee:

         "Let me gaze on the form below me,
              While from yonder ether blue
          Look how the star of eve, bright and tender,
                 lingers o'er me,
              To love thy beauty too!"