Meg heard the sound of fabric tearing as the rough bars of the portcullis caught the sleeve of her shirt. Still, there was just enough room for the petite dancer to wriggle beneath the rusting iron gate and into the candlelit grotto…into the Opera Ghost's lair.
The vault below the theatre's cellars was filled with massive iron candelabras, but only a half dozen candles were lit. It was hardly enough.
She knew that neither Christine nor the Vicomte de Chagny were there. She'd caught a glimpse of them fleeing across the underground lake in an curious black boat with silver fittings.
I know they are safe…there is no reason for me to be here…
In one corner, she saw a throne-like chair. It's ornate carvings were half hidden beneath a discarded black cape.
Something made that cloak stir. Meg wasn't certain what it was, but the cavernous space was rather drafty. Nevertheless, it had attracted her attention and pulled the cloak from the throne.
A white mask lay on the black cushion.
Meg could not understand the sudden loneliness that seemed to settle over her at the sight of that mask.
She picked it up carefully, realizing it was made of smooth, cold porcelain.
She had seen…in a fleeting, terrible glance…the horror that the mask had concealed.
But where was he now, this Phantom?
She saw no sign of him as she made her way to the organ, saw the torn pages of sheet music scattered around it on the floor like petals of a ravaged flower.
A wedding veil lay at her feet. As she bent to pick it up, something on the ivory keys of the organ caught her eye.
Even in the dimness of this lair, she knew it was blood.
His blood?
Do ghosts bleed?
But he isn't a ghost, is he? He's a man…just a man.
She heard the splash of water, the rattling of the portcullis, the shouting of gendarmes and stagehands.
She quickly hid the mask beneath the veil and ran to the gate.
"Meg Giry! Good God, what are you doing here, girl," one of the stage hands shouted at her.
The torches the mob carried made the shadows lurch until it seemed as if the candelabra, the iron bars, the pipes of the organ were all writhing around her.
"I…I was looking for Maman," she lied. She knew Maman had returned to the theatre corridors above. Meg had seen her hurry past…without the Vicomte de Chagny.
They were trying to get in. They were trying to raise the portcullis, but the mechanism was jammed. They couldn't force it up. Others were trying to scale it, but there was no opening at the top, only rough stone.
And not one among them was small enough to crawl beneath it the way Meg had.
"There isn't anyone here!"
She grasped at the iron bars as she shouted to them
"I saw a man…he fled…he fled there…"
She reached through the grate and pointed to an opening in the wall beyond the gate.
"He was there…the Phantom of the Opera!"