Masque de la Terreur: a Gabriel Knight Mystery
Chapter 1, Part III
by Travis Lester, published on February 23, 2001
The sun was slowly at the finish of its descent when Gabriel’s harley coasted up to the bank of his Gran’s property. Leaving the machine, he hopped up the steps leading from the shoulder of the road to the path disecting the front yard, en route to the second set of steps belonging to the house’s beautiful front porch.
Gabriel couldn't help but admire the soft hue of the sky stretched out above him. It was a deep, inky blue to the eastern horizon and on the opposite end, at the western horizon, the sun’s hazy orange glow was in its last stages for the day. In between the two was the real beauty, though. The two rivals did not clash like enemies of the color palate, but meshed in splendor indescribable to even Gabriel’s cerebral thesaurus. He mentally noted to attempt to do so when he’d bedded down for the night. It was an exercise of his, but he also considered it a fun challenge--he’d never come across any sight of marvel that he could not, in time, secure with his words. He loved the challenge.
Gabriel removed his jacket as he bounded up the porch steps, slinging it over his shoulder and allowing it to dangle from his left hand by its collar.
Opening the screen door to an ear-twisting whine, Gabriel smiled at his Gran, whom was seated in her usual spot. She glanced at him warily, never slowing in her needle-point, and returned her eyes to the television.
Gabriel accidentally forgot the weight sensitivity of the screen door, and it closed with a hefty bang.
His Gran did not look at him, but folded her lips inward in an annoyed grimace.
Gabriel easily witheld his smile as he closed the second, a more sturdy, wooden-panel door. He fastened the dead-bolt snuggly and tossed his jacket on the arm of the chair beside his Gran.
“Gabriel!” she hissed.
Gabriel blushed. “Sorry, Gran,” he said, picking his jacket back up and placing it on the coat hanger.
Some things never change, he thought humorously, remembering his days before moving out of the house. He was only 16, but the memory was vividly and easily attainable. The strikingly familiar resonance in his Gran’s hiss of the past few seconds was all he needed to jog his memory of the thousand he’d heard back then.
“Whatcha watchin’, Gran?” Gabriel asked, squinting at the tube.
“Oh, it’s this Survivor nonsense. I tell ya, Gabriel. What is the world comin’ to?”
Gabriel studied the TV for a bit, watching a scantily-clad woman jogging across a beach towards a bonfire.
“Well, Gran, if it’s so bad--why you watchin’ it?”
Gran looked up at Gabriel, narrowing her eyes almost menacingly.
Gabriel smiled at her innocently, raising his hands in defeat.
She smacked his thigh playfully with her free hand and resumed her work. “You had a call while you were out.”
Gabriel remained silent for a moment, watching the cute blonde on the TV. “Oh yeah?” he asked, abstractedly. “Which girl was it this time? Surely not Alyssa.”
“No, I think she finally got the picture yesterday mornin’. This was a new one,” his Gran sighed. “I started to give her the same message as all the others who’d been callin’, but she said she wasn't interested in that.”
Gabriel slowly turned his head, right hand rubbing his aching neck muscles, and looked at her. “Who, then?”
“Her name was strange. Same as her accent, but this is N’Orleans and I don’t pay no nevermind,” she said, eyes still on the TV screen. “Sounded like Garden or somethin’.”
“Gerde?” Gabriel asked uneasily.
“Yes!” she exclaimed, her fingers still working nimbly with the fine-pointed needles. “She said you knew her number.”
Gabriel nodded carefully, mind wandering.
So, what’s this? he asked himself. Let’s hope she’s callin’ only to inform me of another batch of snail-mail from my heart-broken admirers...
“I'm gonna make a call,” Gabriel walked past his Gran and entered the kitchen.
“Okay, hon.” his Gran said, a bit detached. “Just don’t run up the phone bill.”
Gabriel picked up the phone, placing it in the crook of his neck and reaching into the back pocket of his jeans for his wallet. He removed a phone card and began dialing. He went through the automated operator, entering the appropriate number code implied on his card, hitting 1 for English, and 2 for a long-distance call. Then he began the number for Schloss Ritter:
49-09-324-3333.
Two rings completed before he heard the phone pick up on the other end.
“Ja? Schloss Ritter, hier.” came Gerde’s velvet voice.
“Hey,” he said shortly. “It’s me.”
“Ah, Gabriel,” she sounded surprised to hear from him. “I didn't think you’d return my call so soon.”
“Figured it was urgent.”
“Well, yes and no.” she said, seemingly a bit removed. “How is your stay in America?”
“Pretty good, thanks. Missed it,” Gabriel fingered the curly-phone cord with his index finger. “So, what’s up? More hate-mail?”
“No, no,” she whispered. “Nothing like that.”
Gabriel sat silently, listening to her breathe.
Gabriel took hold of the phone with his left hand, easing the strain on his neck. “Then...?”
“Gabriel, I'm not supposed to be calling you about this.” she finally said.
Gabriel already felt out of the loop. “What is it? Has somethin’ happened in the town?”
“I don’t know how to say this, really...”
Gabriel felt it. He felt an uneasiness in his chest--something like a sensory alarm. Something not-so-good was about to happen, and he wasn't going to be able to avoid it. “Tell me...” he said tautly.
“I've been keeping something from you.”
“Just spit it out, will’ya?” Gabriel grunted bitterly.
Gerde sighed in... what? Resentment? Regret?
“Grace and I have...,” she said daintily. “we've been keeping a close correspondence as of late.”
And it fell in on him. He felt it. The collapsing in his chest was like that of an abandoned mine’s downfall long-overdue. He closed his eyes tightly, inhaling a deep snort through his nose.
“we've just been speaking,” she continued. “You know...”
“So?” Gabriel finally said. It came out just as he’d hoped, he thought. For some reason he wanted to seem like he didn't care. Like it was just one added grain of sand to the Sahara.
Gerde sighed again.
“Will you stop that?” Gabriel asked almost chargingly.
“It has been nothing about you, Gabriel.” she said in balmy tone. “She’s just been keeping me updated on what she’s been doing, lately.”
“Well, hey... that’s... y’know, it’s great.” Gabriel slid his free hand into the arm-pit of his occupied one, giving himself a slight half-hug. He stepped back, stretching the cord a bit, and leaned against the sink. “But... how’s this my concern?”
“She asked me for some information, Gabriel.”
Gabriel looked into living room through the doorway. The lights in the kitchen were off, giving it a bit of a cold feeling which heavily contrasted the warm, lamp-lit, orange glow of the living room. The coldness in his chest did not help the mood.
“Information, huh?” he said blankly. “On what?”
Gabriel tried to stop them, but his hopes began to rise... to ascend... reaching for an unknown plane...
“It wasn't about you, Gabriel.” she said, as-if settling any paranoia he had about being talked about.
The hopes faltered in mid-air. Hanging neutrally, wavering with a nervousness--a fear of crashing back down into the bowels of the sadness he’d grown so accustom to.
“Well,” he bit his bottom lip. “Well, I'm all broken up.”
“Don’t take offense.” Gerde replied in reference to his tone. “I'm sure she thinks of you. I've just never chosen to discuss you with her. I thought you would appreciate that, considering...”
Gee, thanks, he thought.
“Yeah.” he muttered, looking down at the dark, tile floor.
“Anyway, she wanted me to go into the SIDney database and look up something for her.” she said. "She's... investigating something."
Gabriel cocked an eyebrow.
“Is that so...”
“Yes,” she whispered. “And... since you took SIDney with you. I thought... well...”
Gabriel nodded. “You thought I’d do the research for ya.”
“She gave me an email address to contact her at. She said I could forward the materials to her.”
Gabriel clenched his teeth in a fury. “M-hmmm.”
“I know it’s a lot to ask of you, but...” she exhaled heavily upon the phone, delivering a swell billow of static into Gabriel’s ear. Had the crackling flames of anger not been so loud in his head, he might have even heard it.
“So, she’s been... what... writin’ you letters this whole year? While I've been gone?” Gabriel tried to sound interested in a polite, caring way to mask his emotion of betrayal.
“Longer.” Gerde whispered again.
You... b*tch...
“Wow,” he said. “Right under my nose, huh?”
“Gabriel, please--I thought it only for the best--”
“No, no,” Gabriel silenced her with a tight, tight tone that was just barely a notch above a reserved nature. “It’s fine, Gerde. I don’t care.”
“Will you do it...?” she asked.
Gabriel shook his head, staring at the ticking-tocking clock beside the refrigerator. He watched the second hand ticking around the clock. It had completed but one and a half of its rounds before Gabriel responded: “You got it.”
“Thank you, Gabriel.” Gerde’s relief was evident.
“So, what’s the subject?”
“She needs some of the files of the Paris opera house. Background. Around eighteen eighty-one.”
Gabriel stared directly head.
“Are you writing this down?” she asked him after a moment.
“Yeah,” he lied casually. “What next?”
“Well, that’s all she asked for in her letter.” Gerde said. “Gabriel, I would have checked the library, but... you know that the database is beyond the library, now.”
Gabriel knew this. SIDney had a search engine built into it that was a bit like a mesh net twenty-five times as capable as the best user-based engine. Therefore, it would pick up anything lying in the library files as well as whatever could be scoured ever-so-dilligently from the Internet.
“I said it’s alright.” Gabriel sighed understandingly. “What’s her email address?”
Gabriel stepped into the living room, the phone call completed.
His Gran looked at him, the TV screen rolling with the finishing credits of Survivor.
“What’s wrong, dear?” she asked him.
He didn't respond, only staring at the email address he’d scribbled onto the palm of his left hand with his ink pen.
What the hell did Grace think she was doin?
First, she ran off on him. Then she... what... was she gonna use his information to do her own Shadow Hunting? Just who the hell did she think she was?
“Gabriel, what is the matter?” she asked a second time.
“Nothin’, Gran,” he said, still not looking up. “I'm gonna go to bed early, okay?”
“What about your supper?” she asked, rising from her seat.
“Not hungry,” Gabriel turned and swiftly made his way up the stairs, branching off to the right--leading to his old bedroom.
Gran returned to her seat, shaking her head. “More things change, the more they stay the same.” she said pointedly.
Gabriel closed his bedroom door behind him and approached the bed.
His room was nearly the same as he’d left it years ago. Most of his child-hood possessions had been boxed up and placed into a corner, but they were still around.
The few effects still intact were a The Spy Who Loved Me poster on the back of the door and a Frankenstein poster beside the window over-looking the front lawn. The poster, once a prized and protected treasure of his, was now covered with dust and its top left corner was hanging down a bit from where the piece of scotch tape had lost its stickiness.
Gabriel went down on all fours beside the bed and peered under it. He pulled out his suitcase and sat it atop the comforter of his bed. He opened it quickly, finding the SIDney laptop. It was the only item in the case since he’d found no reason to unpack it till now.
Gabriel pulled it out and scooted the suitcase aside. Gabriel opened the laptop, pressing the power button and watching it boot up.
The Schattenjäger Talisman wallpaper jumped out at him--he’d nearly forgotten it. Gabriel quickly went into the search database and typed in “Paris opera house.”
Gabriel watched the blinking Talisman cursor and the words “SEARCHING...”
Finally with a quick blink, it had found close to twenty-odd links.
The most important were set into a bold type.
Gabriel cocked his thin, light-brown eyebrow once again upon reading the link at the very top of the list:
“The Labyrinth Of Solitude - Do you seek the Phantom of the Opera? Enter if you dare, the catacombs deep beneath the Paris Opera House, but be warned: Your life is in your own hands! Be careful, for it might not be when you decide to leave! If He allows it!”
Sh*t, Gracie, Gabriel thought, brushing back his hair with his left hand and leaning against the bed with his other. Just what the hell have you gotten yourself into?
Last update: October 25, 2007
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