The Phantom of the Opera | Page 8

had to be carried to her
dressing-room. A few subscribers, however, protested. Why had so
great a treasure been kept from them all that time? Till then, Christine
Daae had played a good Siebel to Carlotta's rather too splendidly

material Margarita. And it had needed Carlotta's incomprehensible and
inexcusable absence from this gala night for the little Daae, at a
moment's warning, to show all that she could do in a part of the
program reserved for the Spanish diva! Well, what the subscribers
wanted to know was, why had Debienne and Poligny applied to Daae,
when Carlotta was taken ill? Did they know of her hidden genius? And,
if they knew of it, why had they kept it hidden? And why had she kept
it hidden? Oddly enough, she was not known to have a professor of
singing at that moment. She had often said she meant to practise alone
for the future. The whole thing was a mystery.
The Comte de Chagny, standing up in his box, listened to all this frenzy
and took part in it by loudly applauding. Philippe Georges Marie
Comte de Chagny was just forty-one years of age. He was a great
aristocrat and a good-looking man, above middle height and with
attractive features, in spite of his hard forehead and his rather cold eyes.
He was exquisitely polite to the women and a little haughty to the men,
who did not always forgive him for his successes in society. He had an
excellent heart and an irreproachable conscience. On the death of old
Count Philibert, he became the head of one of the oldest and most
distinguished families in France, whose arms dated back to the
fourteenth century. The Chagnys owned a great deal of property; and,
when the old count, who was a widower, died, it was no easy task for
Philippe to accept the management of so large an estate. His two sisters
and his brother, Raoul, would not hear of a division and waived their
claim to their shares, leaving themselves entirely in Philippe's hands, as
though the right of primogeniture had never ceased to exist. When the
two sisters married, on the same day, they received their portion from
their brother, not as a thing rightfully belonging to them, but as a dowry
for which they thanked him.
The Comtesse de Chagny, nee de Moerogis de La Martyniere, had died
in giving birth to Raoul, who was born twenty years after his elder
brother. At the time of the old count's death, Raoul was twelve years of
age. Philippe busied himself actively with the youngster's education.
He was admirably assisted in this work first by his sisters and afterward
by an old aunt, the widow of a naval officer, who lived at Brest and

gave young Raoul a taste for the sea. The lad entered the Borda
training-ship, finished his course with honors and quietly made his trip
round the world. Thanks to powerful influence, he had just been
appointed a member of the official expedition on board the Requin,
which was to be sent to the Arctic Circle in search of the survivors of
the D'Artoi's expedition, of whom nothing had been heard for three
years. Meanwhile, he was enjoying a long furlough which would not be
over for six months; and already the dowagers of the Faubourg
Saint-Germain were pitying the handsome and apparently delicate
stripling for the hard work in store for him.
The shyness of the sailor-lad--I was almost saying his innocence-- was
remarkable. He seemed to have but just left the women's apron-strings.
As a matter of fact, petted as he was by his two sisters and his old aunt,
he had retained from this purely feminine education manners that were
almost candid and stamped with a charm that nothing had yet been able
to sully. He was a little over twenty-one years of age and looked
eighteen. He had a small, fair mustache, beautiful blue eyes and a
complexion like a girl's.
Philippe spoiled Raoul. To begin with, he was very proud of him and
pleased to foresee a glorious career for his junior in the navy in which
one of their ancestors, the famous Chagny de La Roche, had held the
rank of admiral. He took advantage of the young man's leave of
absence to show him Paris, with all its luxurious and artistic delights.
The count considered that, at Raoul's age, it is not good to be too good.
Philippe himself had a character that was very well-balanced in work
and pleasure alike; his demeanor was always faultless; and he was
incapable of setting his brother a bad example. He took him with him
wherever he went. He even introduced him to the foyer of the ballet. I
know that the count was