“I have no doubt of it,” replied the young man gravely, for it seemed to him that his friend, in obedience to a pious thought, was connecting the memory of her father with the brilliancy of her last triumph.
Christine appeared astonished at the Vicomte de Chagny’s coolness:
“How do you understand it?” she asked, bringing her pale face so close to his that he might have thought that Christine was going to give him a kiss; but she only wanted to read his eyes in spite of the dark.
“I understand,” he said, “that no human being can sing as you sang the other evening without the intervention of some miracle. No professor on earth can teach you such accents as those. You have heard the Angel of Music, Christine.”
“Yes,” she said solemnly, “ in my dressing-room . That is where he comes to give me my lessons daily.”
“In your dressing-room?” he echoed stupidly.
“Yes, that is where I have heard him; and I have not been the only one to hear him.”
“Who else heard him, Christine?”
“You, my friend.”
“I? I heard the Angel of Music?”
“Yes, the other evening, it was he who was talking when you were listening behind the door. It was he who said, ‘You must love me.’ But I then thought that I was the only one to hear his voice. Imagine my astonishment when you told me, this morning, that you could hear him too.”