She couldn’t respond with anything other than a blank stare and a whimper, so I interceded. “Where’s your curiosity, Christine? Don’t you want to see what will happen?” She still didn’t move, so I ground my teeth. “Turn one of them quickly. You’re running out of time, and I’m running out of patience with you and your fickle indecision.”
I pulled her close to me and glared into her eyes. “I’ll leave you now for the last time, my sweet. When I return, if you haven’t made it, I’ll make it for you. Do you understand?”
She barely nodded, and I released her shoulder with a shove. Then I stormed back into my music room and slammed the door. I charged back and forth and came very close to dismantling the room again. I paced and fumed, paced and fumed, until I swung the door open again.
“Have you made up your mind?” I demanded, as I started across the room toward her, but then I heard another voice, Oded’s.
“Erik, listen to me. It’s not too late to do the right thing.”
“Be quiet, you foolish, persistent daroga,” I demanded coldly. “I don’t want to hear your voice again. If I do, then it’s over. This is none of your affair. It’s Christine’s decision to make. Stay out of it.”
I glared at Christine for only a moment and then at the figurines. I shook my head at her and then started quickly toward the mantle. She turned instantly and grabbed for the scorpion.
“Look! Erik! I turned it! I turned the scorpion!” she screamed and began crying again.
We stood in complete silence. Christine was looking at the floor, and I was looking at her.
It was done—finished. We’d completed the second scene, and we were exhausted.
She looked as if she was going to faint again, so I took her gently by the arm and sat her on the divan; then I placed the glass of wine in her hands. I stood back, watching her, and began to feel the slicing claws of remorse tearing my flesh. She’d turned the one I wanted her to turn, so, in my power play, I’d won. But, at the heart of it all, I’d lost miserably. I still didn’t know exactly how she felt about me, although, at that moment, I didn’t see how she could feel anything but loathing for me.
That should have been the end of the second scene, as far as I’d written the script, but the intruders in the mirror chamber had complicated the plot, and I was forced to do some instant rewrites. As I watched Christine, and my temper began to wane, I started to feel weariness and the beginning of one of those mental positions where I no longer wanted to think. I wanted to be with Molly, riding across a green plateau. I really wanted to be anywhere other than where I was.
My exhaustion from no sleep and constant emotional drain was taking its toll on me, and my thinking ability was severely hindered. I needed to say something to Christine, but the only thing I could think of was to tell her how sorry I was and to send her on her way. I was ready to speak her name when Raoul’s voice came through the wall.
“Christine, are you still in there?”
She looked at me quickly, with wide eyes, and I narrowed my eyes and shook my head at her. She began breathing deeply and my own thoughts were charging back and forth within me. I wanted to release her, but the sound of his voice filled me once more with hatred. Again, there was a cry from behind the wall and, as she started to answer, I said her name and softly told her to be silent.
Quietly, I told her, “His pleas are pathetic, don’t you think? But don’t worry about him, he’ll not die alone. He has good company in there, and they’ll be able to help each other during the ordeal of their last breaths.”
Her body stiffened and she verbally charged on me. “You lied to me. You said it would be safe to turn the scorpion, and I turned it, so now they should be safe. What is this talk of death? What have you done?”
I jumped to my feet and growled, “There you go again, blaming me for everything that goes wrong. I’ve kept my end of the bargain. I gave you a choice of the scorpion with a yes and life, or the grasshopper with a no and the death of thousands. You chose the scorpion, and with it came forth water to render lifeless the power to destroy so many. That has been done. I kept my word. The thousands are saved.
“Is it my fault there are foolish ones in the world who trespass where they don’t belong? Is it my fault they were in the way of the water? Can I be charged with their ignorance and lack of forethought? Can you blame the lion tamer if he warns people to stay back and they don’t and the lion eats them? No, I don’t think so. Can I be blamed for the deaths of the two fools in my home when they were both warned to stay clear of my lair? No, I don’t think so.”
I could see her chest rise rapidly and her eyes widen as she looked back over her shoulder toward the chamber. Then the sounds coming from the chamber spoke loud and clear that both Oded and Raoul feared they were soon to drown, and the panic set into her eyes again.
“Oh, Erik, please, please, don’t let them die. This isn’t the Erik I knew. This isn’t the Erik who took my hand so gently. This isn’t My Angel who instructed me with soft words and patience. This isn’t you, Erik.” She looked frantically at the chamber. “Erik, please.”
“You beg me for their lives? How often have I been on my knees before you begging for my life, Christine?” Mockingly, I went down on one knee before her with spread arms. “Perhaps when you’ve been in this position as many times as I have, I’ll listen to you.”
There were sounds of splashing water and groans on the other side of the wall and her eyes were so frightened, more so than during all the previous hours. I felt my jaws ache, and that sting in the back of my eyes increased. I lowered my head and tried to bring back the rage, but, all of a sudden, I didn’t know what it was all for.
I struggled to think about what I was doing and why, but I was feeling just as confused as I imagined the men in that chamber were. What was I trying to accomplish by forcing the woman I loved to tell me she loved me? What good would it do if it were forced? I couldn’t think. Again, my exhaustion was fogging my mind, and I struggled for clear and quick thinking ability, but it was hard to come by.
“Please, Erik,” she begged again.
I looked up into her eyes as they filled with tears, and I began to ache all over. I wanted to double up and groan in agony. What was I doing? I felt my heart cracking in two as I watched Christine in such anguish before me. She looked deep into my eyes and began pleading away the remainder of my hardened shell.
“Where is the Erik I’ve come to cherish? Oh, Erik, please.”
I lowered my head and laid my forehead on her knee, and then I felt her hand on the back of my head. I sighed deeply as my eyes swelled with tears, and I allowed my pain to sink deep into my chest.
“Christine, please love me,” I sobbed.
I felt her fingers moving through my hair, and I heard her sniffles and her soft voice caress my senses.
“What happened to that man who shed tears over a piece of music? What happened to the man who cried because of the death of Jacob, a fictional person in a novel? Are the flesh and blood men here with us who are fighting for their very lives not worth more than a fictional man written on the pages of a book? Where’s my Erik? Where’s that man who kissed César’s nose with the tender care of a gentle mother? Where is he, Erik?”
She ran her fingers along the side of my jaws and asked, “Where’s the Erik I knew, whose eyes moistened every time we sang the death scene from Romeo et Juliette? Oh, Erik, where is he? What happened to that man who captured my heart as none other? Where’s the Erik I sang and laughed with? Where’s the man who marveled at the beauty of a tree? Where is he, Erik?”
Then I felt her hand under my chin, and she raised my face up to her. She ran her fingers across my forehead, moving my hair aside.
“Please, Erik.”
I watched her eyes closely, and I finally realized if she stayed with me it would only be to save her lover and not to stay with the one man in the world who loved her the most. She cradled my face in her hands and her eyes once more filled with tear
s.
Her head slightly shook, and she whispered, “This can’t be happening. Oh, Erik, please tell me this is nothing more than a terrible nightmare. Please let me wake up to your music the way I did once. Oh, Erik,” she whimpered, and then my lifelong dream began to unfold.
She closed her eyes, and her soft lips pressed against my forehead, and they remained there for a long kiss while my heart ruptured and seeped tears of ruby red. I received my first kiss, and I couldn’t hold back my tears—even if I’d tried.
My long awaited kiss had finally arrived. After 45 years of wishing for the touch of a woman’s lips on my skin, I finally felt it, and I wanted it to last forever. But, along with my first kiss, I also felt the pain of her tears as they mingled with her kiss on my face. My heart was pounding as never before, and I struggled for breath as her lips parted from me. Her lips were only a breath away when I felt her next words on my forehead.
“Where’s that man? Oh, Erik, where is he? I miss my Erik, my poor Erik. Please bring him back to me.”
She pulled back, and, when I opened my eyes, she was again looking into mine. Her tears were streaming down her cheeks and my heart swelled and my breaths increased with the feel of my first kiss. We stayed locked in that precious moment until she lowered her face to mine and kissed my forehead once more. Her lips remained there longer that time, and when she backed away, I opened my eyes and searched desperately for that expression in her eyes that I’d been seeking.
Her palms were still holding my face, and her pleading eyes and voice beseeched me, “Erik, please.”
Then it happened, something much more important than my first kiss. Her eyes changed right before mine, and I saw it. There it was. There it finally was, that look I’d been waiting for, for so long. That look of love that only the eyes can speak. She loved me, and I could see it, I could finally see it. She loved me.
I broke. My face fell upon her knees, and I sobbed like a baby.
“Erik, please let them out,” she whispered to me.
Other than my sobs, the room fell to silence while she continued to run her fingers through my hair. Gradually, enough of my awareness returned, and I realized it was much too late. I moved back on my heels, releasing my face from her hands, and then I actually chuckled, causing her to look strangely at me. I was laughing and crying all at the same time, and all I could think about was, why now? Why now when all was lost? Why now?
I laughed softly, and Christine frowned. “Why are you laughing?”
With my arms spread and my palms and cries directed toward the heavens, I begged our maker. “Why now? Why the look of love and love’s first kiss from the woman I love, now? Why now?” I looked back at her and wagged my head. “If I were a jester in a court of appeals, perhaps a chance to love, perhaps a chance to live, perhaps a chance to appeal. I’m but a jester on life’s stage, and there’s no court of appeals. It’s too late. The judges are back, the stone faces with the verdict of death.”
“Erik! what are you talking about?” she asked, with concern in her crystal pools.
“Who would have thought—death by love’s first kiss? I’m but the jester who laughs as a madman at injustice. Life—thoughts, desires, and twisted riddles in a hurricane—nothing more. Now that love’s first kiss has awakened the madman’s heart, the verdict is in. Love’s first kiss surrenders my soul in place of my accuser’s. This jester is ready and laughingly waits at death’s door, prepared for a madman’s sentencing. The supreme judge is seated and casts his sight on me. A thumb down is his only response. I could perhaps have a chance if I were a jester in a court of appeals.”
“Erik! You’re frightening me.”
“If I but a jester be, I could change the tides, I could alter the course of a river. With the slight movement of my fingers or the quick variation in thought, I could transform the course of events. But I not a jester be. I not a jester be. No change in tides, no alteration in rivers, no transformation in events. I not a jester be in a court of appeals. I be mortal, frail, broken. I not a jester be, Christine. Not a jester be.”
Her eyes filled with panic, and she shook her head and then seriously frowned.
Without breaking our eye contact, I rose to my feet, and asked, “Why now?” I shook my head and spread my hands, again asking, “Why now?” I stepped back until I was against the fireplace, and once more asked, “Why now?”
I reached for the scorpion and turned it one more click, causing Christine to jump up and scream, “No!”
Then with total fear on her face, and I don’t know what on mine, we felt the floor rumble slightly as the pump in my wine cellar reversed gears and started pumping the water out of the mirror chamber. I was watching Christine’s face closely when I realized it was too quiet. There was no more splashing water or struggling voices, and then it was no longer only Christine who was filled with panic. I also feared the worst. I feared it was too late for the latest victims of my brilliance. Her eyes were desperately searching mine for an answer to her plea.
She came up to me, and breathlessly pleaded, “Please hurry and open the door.”
I looked at her and felt so much pressure inside my chest, as if my heart was exploding. How could I tell her I was helpless? How could I tell her I couldn’t open the door for probably another ten minutes? I moved over to the door to the mirror chamber and leaned my chest against it, with my arms outstretched and groaned.
She was right beside me when she asked again, “Erik, please open the door.”
I looked down into her fearful blue eyes and her bruised and tear-streaked face and asked myself, how can I tell her they were trapped in there until the water receded? How can I tell her the chances of them surviving their ordeal were almost nil? How can I tell her I’d killed her childhood sweetheart? How can I tell her?
Fifty
“Erik! What are you waiting for? Please, open the door!”
I lowered my head between my arms and whispered, “I can’t.”
“What do you mean, you can’t? You can’t or you won’t?”
I laid my forearms against the wall and my forehead against my doubled fists, and then I whispered again, “I’m only mortal. I’m not a god. I’m only mortal. I can change nothing. The script is written and being played. It’s too late for a rewrite.”
“You’re not making any sense. Talk straight to me.” Then while shaking my arm, she pleaded, “Help them.”
My head shook. “I’m not a god. I’m only mortal.”
“Erik, look at me.” She took my chin and turned my head, saying again, “Help them!”
I couldn’t look her in the eyes, so I again shook my head and repeated, “I’m not a god. I’m only mortal.”
Softly, she said, “Erik—hold me.”
She got my attention with that out-of-place request. How could she want me to touch her—much less hold her? But she repeated it again and then moved in close to me, wrapping her arms around my back. Slowly, my arms found their way around her back, and then I broke completely. In sobs, my gruesome face fell on her shoulder, and I stayed there, sobbing.
In retrospect, I now realize how close I was to losing my mind completely that day, and, to this day, I shudder to think about what would have happened if I had. But my precious, precious Christine somehow brought me back to a semi-sane state. When I calmed, I backed away and then turned my face away from her pleading eyes.
“Erik, help them,” she again tried.
Again, I shook my head. “There’s no way. My brilliance has outsmarted us all—even me.” I huffed and almost laughed. “Oh, how my own brilliance has outsmarted me. If there were only a way around it, a way to unwind it, a way to turn back time, I would dance on my own grave.”
“Erik, please don’t talk in riddles. Not now.”
I shook my head one more time. “Riddles? My life is a riddle, a twisted, lying riddle!”
“Oh, Erik, please. We need you. Please help us. No more lies and no more riddles.”
I couldn’t
bear to look at her, so I looked at the floor and tried to explain in straight-forward words. “No more lies. What I say is truth—the horrible truth. My safety room is meant to protect me. It has protected me from those men in there who meant to harm me, and now it’s protecting me from anyone on this side of the wall harming me. It’s protecting me even from the woman I love and from me.”
“What are you saying?” she asked while looking intently at the wall. “You built it. You have to know how to get in there.”
With more sorrow than I can express, I replied, “It’s because I built it that I know there’s no way of getting in.”
She whimpered, “No! No!” Then, with courage, she gathered herself together and told me, “You always have a way of solving problems, Erik. Find a solution. Explain to me how that room works and maybe you can hear in your own words the solution.”
I was still shaking my head, but I agreed, mostly because it would help pass the time until we could enter that room.
“Oded found my passage in the third cellar and led Raoul into it, thinking it would lead them into my home. But, true to my design, they entered the passage that I told you never to go down, instead of the one leading to my music room. When they reached its end, there was only one way for them to go and that was down through a trap door into the mirror chamber.
“Once in there, they couldn’t go back up through the trap door, because I deliberately placed it too high to reach, not even if they stood on each other’s shoulders. So they were trapped in there with no way out, except through this hidden door right here,” I said as I knocked on the wall in front of me.
“It probably didn’t take Oded long to realize where they were, even if it was completely dark in there. He’s been in one of my mirror chambers before, but as my helper and not as my enemy. As soon as the motion sensor in that room was triggered, it clicked on the heating mechanism. Then, when I suspected someone was in there, I switched on a bright light. The light and heat, along with an iron tree that was reflected a hundred times by the mirrors, were designed to disorientate my enemy and allow me time to decide what to do with them.
Through Phantom Eyes: Volume Five - Christine Page 72
