Visual Art

I thought I would use this page to show off some visual art I have done lately. I don't consider this to be my strongest skill, but I took highschool courses in it and enjoyed them. These days if I pick up a pencil it will probably be to make a Celtic knotwork drawing (like the one I painted onto the gearshift of my car!) - but Chapter 11 of the book I wrote mentions several drawings. Here is an excerpt that includes those drawings. Enjoy!

While I waited for Christine to realize she loved me, I had other problems that I needed to worry about. Several opera patrons had noticed her, even stuck in the back row of dancers as she was, and small gifts were starting to trickle in from men who wished to court her. She never warmed up in the Salon de Danse, as I kept her in the dressing room before performances, but even so the gentlemen had begun sniffing around. I noticed a new bracelet studded with rubies on her wrist, and asked her who it was from.

“Monsieur Villeneuve sent this to me with his compliments,” she said with satisfaction, stroking the shining gold. “It’s about time someone sent me something. If I’d had to listen to all the other girls brag about their gifts for another day I think I’d have gone mad!”

A pair of cheap earrings appeared from Monsieur Martin. Then a stunning bouquet of white roses from Monsieur Laurent. Finally, a fine fur stole appeared with the compliments of Monsieur Dubois. She left the roses in the dressing room she practised in with me, and wore the other gifts when she wasn’t in costume. Each gift sounded an alarm bell in my mind, and by the time the stole arrived I knew I had to take action.

I sent M. Villeneuve a letter warning him that I had had Mlle. Daaé’s promise of her hand in marriage, and I would appreciate him backing off of my fiancée. I signed it only with a drawing of a skull, one which had brilliant gemstones in its eye sockets. This didn’t sit well with me after I had sent it, not because I had blatantly lied, but because it would have been too easy for him to check with Christine if he had wished to pursue her apparent rejection further. I didn’t wish to deal with the awkwardness if Christine realized that I had lied and deduced that I had done so because I loved her.

To deal with M. Martin, I decided that I must lean on my reputation as the Opera Ghost. I sent him a drawing of an ear, dripping with blood and bearing a dangling skull as an earring. I sketched in Christine’s distinctive dark curls behind the ear. The onyx ring on my hand caught my eye as I worked on the curls, and I smiled a little. The association that the ring had for me had slowly changed from violation, mistrust and rage to the dark perfumed ringlets that spilled down Christine’s back. I pulled my attention back to my drawing and wrote two little words on it: Non, merci. I posted it to his address.

For M. Laurent I bought three white roses, ripped the petals off and dipped the bottom half of each petal in blood-red paint I had purloined from the scene-painting department. I piled all the dried petals into an envelope, with a note that read: Non, merci. The note included a little sketch of a rose in full bloom with a tiny skull nestled in its center. I posted it to his address.

For M. Dubois, I killed five of the rats who were always trying to invade my home, carefully skinned them of their little furry pelts and stretched the skins to dry over my stove. When they were dried, I took the little furs and put them into a box, with a note that read: Non, merci. The drawing on this note depicted a skull sitting in the middle of a fur stole draped around it. I posted it to his address.

I knew that these four men knew one another and might talk about the macabre gifts they had received. I counted on it, actually. I hoped as they discussed it they might deduce that all four of the things I had sent were actually warnings. I wanted them to know that Mlle. Daaé was off-limits, and to spread the word. If any of them wondered why Christine continued to wear their gifts in public after having apparently sent them this rejection, it wasn’t my concern.

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