~ The Iron Key ~
With Quasimodo and Erik on either side of him, Cyrano places the iron key on the First Consul's desk. Napoleon picks up the key and frowns in thought.
“Too small for a door. Too rough in construction for a trinket box. Too queer for a common chest. And see the teeth—fourteen in number. The lock it is meant for must be of extreme complexity. How singular!”
Erik speaks. “A key with fourteen teeth in a portrait of Louis the XIV. And with such a costly lock, I could be led to believe they were commissioned by none other than the monarch himself.”
“But that monarch is dead,” Cyrano says.
“Why should that matter?” Erik asks.
“Because the key was in a secret place. And the best secrets are known to few. If indeed this was Louis the XIV's key, he would entrust its use to a small number.”
“It is of little matter at present,” Napoleon says. “I must prepare you three to stage a prison break.”
From a drawer in the grand desk, he produces an impeccably folded schematic which he unfolds to reveal the innards of an underground network of tunnels. Using a thin baton to point, Napoleon explains.
“There are places in the catacombs beneath our city that I use for prisons for certain individuals of import. For all the general public knows, these tunnels either do not exist or they cannot be reached due to cave-ins. This section here contains six guards and thirty cells. General Claude-Luc de Tupen is in this cell here. You will emerge from a secret passageway three halls over—here. Use stealth, but do not rely upon it solely. Kill the guards—all of them—before you extract Tupen. That will ensure a safe escape back from whence you came.”
“Kill all the guards?” Cyrano exclaims. “First Consul, are they not soldiers pledged to your command?”
Napoleon's dark eyes seem to sparkle. “Murderers, rapists, and thieves, all of them, worse even than the prisoners they guard. All have committed crimes worthy of hanging, much less discharge. And they have all been led to think that receiving guard duty in a dank prison is their punishment. See to it they receive their worthy due.”
“I am no man's executioner!” Cyrano argues. “Humph! I say humph to you, sir!”
Napoleon locks eyes with the swordsman and places his hand partially inside his jacket. At first, everyone thinks the First Consul might be reaching for a weapon, but he only leaves his hand there.
“Monsieur De Bergerac, you forget who commands you, who liberated you, and who will liberate your love should you succeed. You were a soldier. This is merely an act of war to prevent a greater one. You come from a nobler, less effective time. These guards are deserving of death, but even in dying they can be of use.”
Cyrano crosses his arms. “Then I will give each of them time to draw.”
Napoleon grins. “And if they draw carbine rifles in place of swords? What then?”
Before Cyrano can answer, the Phantom speaks. “I will see to the guards—all of them. Monsieur De Bergerac need not sully his sword or honor. Besides, I am at home in dark subterrains.”
“What will you do?” Cyrano asks with a sneer. “Drop sconces on their heads?”
“Will you use your notorious Punjab lasso on them?” Napoleon asks with restrained excitement.
“I'm deaf, you know!” Quasimodo tells the masked Erik with mounting frustration.
The Phantom of the Opera laughs like gentle thunder, quailing the heart of every man there save the deaf Hunchback.
“No, no, my friends! I am through with those old tricks from my old life! Since my untimely…dismissal, I have acquired new powers, shall we say?”
“What new powers do you speak of?” Cyrano asks. “Illusions? Hypnotic suggestions? A complex mechanical invention that augments your low cunning?”
The Phantom's eyes shine inside his mask. “You shall see, Monsieur. Or rather, you shall hear!”
Chapter 7