As the dancers made their way to the ballet foyer, they discussed the horrible death of Buquet.
On the stairs Mercier, the managers' assistant, stopped them when he overheard their conversation.
"Have you girls heard about Buquet already? Most people haven't, so please forget about it for tonight."
He waggled a finger at them. "And don't let Monsieur Debienne and Monsieur Poligny hear.
It would upset the managers too much on their last night at the opera house."
By the time the dancers reached the foyer, it was already full of people.
Everyone was talking about the amazing performance they'd just witnessed.
Many of the great composers of the day had appeared onstage, conducting their own works.
But the real star was the young singer Christine Daaé.
She'd begun with a few selections from Romeo and Juliet and concluded by singing the leading role of Marguerite in some excerpts from Faust. Romeo and JulietFaust
Carlotta, a famous Spanish diva, usually sang Marguerite, but she was ill that night.
So Christine, who usually portrayed a boy in Faust, had taken her place. Faust
And what a magnificent performance she'd given!
The whole audience had risen to its feet, shouting, cheering, clapping, while a sobbing Christine was overcome by the response.
She'd fainted in the arms of other singers and been carried to her dressing room.
Everyone in the foyer wanted to know why Christine hadn't appeared in a leading role before this performance.
Even more mysterious was the rumor that she didn't have a voice coach.
"I hear she plans to keep rehearsing on her own with no intention of finding a coach," one audience member confided to another.
"Well, whatever she's doing, it's working. I attended one of her performances six months ago, and the difference between then and now . . ."
The other man paused. "It's unbelievable."
Philippe, the Count de Chagny, should have been in the foyer, supporting his favorite dancer, Sorelli, as she gave her speech to the managers.
Instead he was following his much younger brother, Raoul, the Viscount de Chagny, through the maze of passages that led to Christine's dressing room.
"Why are you in such a hurry?" Philippe asked his brother.
"Didn't you see that poor woman faint? I must make sure she's all right!"
Philippe smiled at his younger brother's urgent tone. Raoul was only 21, and obviously infatuated with the lovely young Christine.
The two brothers forced their way through a crowd of singers and fans gathered outside Christine's dressing room.
They reached her door just as the theater's doctor was arriving. Raoul rushed to the unconscious singer's side while Philippe and the others pushed into the room.
"Everyone should clear the room," Raoul said to the doctor. "There's no space to breathe in here."
"You're quite right." The doctor sent everyone away except Christine's maid and Raoul.
Christine's eyelashes fluttered as she regained consciousness.
Turning her head, she spotted Raoul at her side and started. "Monsieur," she said in a barely audible voice, "who are you?"
"Mademoiselle . . ." Raoul knelt on one knee and kissed her hand.
"I'm the boy who went into the sea to rescue your scarf."
Christine looked nervously at the doctor and her maid, trying to gauge what they thought of Raoul's odd remark.
When they laughed, Christine joined in, though she still looked uneasy.
Raoul turned red with embarrassment and stood up. "Mademoiselle, since you don't seem to recognize me, I'd like to say something to you in private. Something very important."
Christine's voice shook. "You must wait until I am better."
The doctor nodded. "Please go now and let me attend to mademoiselle."
"Thank you, doctor, but I would like to be alone." Christine looked nervously around the room. "Please go away, all of you."
The doctor tried to protest, but observing Christine's agitation, he escorted Raoul from the room.
"She's not her usual self; she's usually so gentle," the doctor said.
He bid Raoul good night and left him in the now deserted passage.
Raoul thought Christine might attend the farewell ceremony in the ballet foyer, so he lingered in the shadows near her doorway.
Soon the dressing room door opened, and her maid came out, carrying a bundle of laundry.
"Excuse me, how is she?" Raoul asked.
"She's quite well, but you must not disturb her because she wants to be alone. Good night, sir." The maid hurried away.
"Of course Christine told her maid that she wants to be alone," Raoul said to himself.
"That's because she's waiting for me. She knows I want to speak to her in private."
Raoul was about to knock on the door when he heard a man's voice inside the room.
"Christine, do you love me?" the man said.
"How can you ask that when I sing only for you?" Christine sounded sad and on the verge of tears.
Raoul's heart was pounding so loudly that he was sure Christine and the man could hear it.
The man spoke again. "Are you very tired, my dear?"
"Yes, I gave you my soul tonight, and I'm dead tired."
"Your soul is a beautiful thing, and I thank you. No emperor ever received so rare a gift."
Overcome with jealousy, Raoul heard nothing after that.
But he now understood why Christine was so nervous:
she was expecting this visitor.
Raoul returned to the shadows, determined to wait for the man to leave the room.
To his surprise, Christine appeared first, and she was alone.
Raoul was still too rattled by what he'd overheard to approach her.
He waited a few minutes before opening the door to her dressing room and found himself in complete darkness because the gaslights had been turned off.
"I know someone's in here," Raoul said with his back against the door. "Why are you hiding?"
He lit the gas and searched behind the curtain that divided the room, but no one was there.
"I must be going mad!" he thought.
Raoul left the room in a daze. At the bottom of a staircase he felt an icy draft.
Suddenly two men were behind him, carrying something under a white sheet.
"Excuse me," Raoul said. "Can you tell me the way out?"
"The door's open straight ahead," one man grunted.
"Thank you. What's that you're carrying?"
"That is Joseph Buquet, the chief stagehand, whose body was found tonight in the third cellar beneath the stage," the man explained.
Raoul removed his hat as a mark of respect for the dead and let the men pass.
