If it looks like I'm racing through the last of these short stories so I can move on to something else... it's probably because I am. Not that some of these haven't been good, but I'm hungering to check out something different after spending so long in short story land.

Also, because stories like this make me a little sad inside, and I'm naively hoping the next thing will be better.

"The Grotto" by Thomas Millstead, 1989

From Phantoms, edited by Martin H. Greenberg & Rosalind M. Greenberg, 1989

Grade: D+

So many stories dealing with the Phantom are founded upon the dreaded what-if principle. I know, I know... we all have those moments. We think, "What if the characters from the Phantom had been on the Titanic when it sank?" or, "What if the Phantom was secretly gay and sleeping with the managers?" (Actual examples from stories, not my own musings.) But the average person thinks that little what-if, has a good chuckle over it, and goes on their merry way without giving it much more thought. Writers can often make use of the what-if principle--for example, "What if humans were able to make contact with alien life?" is one of the driving what-ifs behind the modern science fiction genre. This is the good kind of what-if.

However, there also exists the bad kind of what-if. Like, "What if the Phantom of the Opera ran away after Leroux's novel and moved into a prehistoric cave beneath the Pyrennes and kidnapped another opera singer only she was much prettier and nicer than that dumb Christine and she stayed to help him write his opera which was going to be the best thing ever and he kidnapped some wandering archeologists so he would have an audience and they made the primordial music of earth even though he really ought to be dead for a lot of reasons?" This is not a good what-if. It is a what-if that makes literature, as a genre, sad.

My ultimate feeling for this story is one of disappointment. So many things could have been better, and so many things were actually pretty good, that the end result made me cranky. It was like opening my fancy parchment menu printed all in French and discovering that it contained nothing but TV dinners.

There were warning signs, at the beginning, that I might not have been dealing with the most carfeully-crafted narrative in the anthology. Sentences just a hair shy of run-on and exposition with that delicious whiff of info-dumping already had me nervous and skittish. Is it really necessary to say things like, "...in the past century it appeared unlikely that there were more of those Prehistoric caves in these lonely foothills of the Pyrennes so close to the Spanish border," in the prose, all in one sentence? I promise, those of us that don't know where the Pyrennes are probably don't care. But, like the good sport I am, I figured this was mostly nitpicky stuff, so I forged on (and tried to control my urge to be unreasonable about Millstead's writing style so early in the game).

Basically, as the excellent summary above states, this story is about two archaeologists who find a prehistoric cave full of prehistoric cave art (and, unfortunately, also full of the Phantom of the Opera... somehow). Now, I'm not sure exactly what archaeological procedure dictates in these situations, but lack of expertise has never stopped me from expressing an opinion before. So one of these guys literally falls into the cave, and his buddy comes down to check it out, and they see all these cave drawings and are madly excited and it's the find of a lifetime. Cool. I get that part. But is it normal to wander around underground by yourselves, armed only with flashlight and sneakers, when you make a major archaeological find? These guys are, supposedly, professionals. Wouldn't you rather call your friends, register your find, and return to spelunk with a trained team and the proper equipment, rather than stumbling around in the dark just begging to fall off a precipice or cause a cave-in? These are concerns I would have, were I in their places, but then again I'm no archaeological expert. Maybe we can just put it all down to professional enthusiasm, because from the way this find is described, I can certainly see why they'd be practically combusting with excitement. The language used to describe the find, particularly the cave paintings, is by turns evocative or powerful, conveying a sense of vibrancy and profundity to something I normally think of as sort of faded and boring. In fact, the sense of passionate awe in these passages is well above and beyond the rest of the writing in terms of both style and poignancy, leading me to wonder if Millstead might be a member of the archaeological profession himself. I did a little internet research and it turns out that his only other writing credit (that I could find... apparently he's had a few short pieces published, but I can't find a record of them anywhere) is a children's book about prehistoric humans--so it seems like that could be a clue. God knows my prose is better when I'm writing about something I'm genuinely interested in than when I'm just writing exposition.

Anyway, there's some stumbling around in the darkness, some marveling at a cave painting of a shaman wearing a giant deer-hide mask with antlers (OMG FORESHADOWING U GUYS!), and they hear some ghostly pure soprano voice coming from somewhere (OMG!), and then, in the space of two paragraphs, suddenly one dude is missing and everyone is lost in the dark. I was really very confused as to how this happened (I went back and read it again, and apparently one guy ran off to chase the ghostly voice, now a ghostly face, and the other one fell down in the dark and lost his flashlight), which always makes me cranky. Obfuscating prose on purpose is one thing; being unable to write clear action sequences is quite another.

But, that's okay. I moved on. Look how trusting I am, despite the implausibility of a soprano running around underground in a white dress with no source of illumination. I figured it might be a ghost story or a metaphor or something. But then, she reappeared to grab the remaining guy and beg him to save her from the Phantom of the Opera, who now lives here after having run away from Paris during the events of Leroux's novel.

Dammit.

I was saddened, you know? This could have had a lot of potential. I got a real spine-tingle when they were describing the cave paintings of the masked shaman, and I was really interested to see how Millstead was planning to tell a parallel story in this very new and, at least to me, unique setting. But then, it turned out to be just a tired old retread of the "Phantom moves somewhere else, bothers some more people" storyline, and I was sad. What a chance was lost. Also, my often-seen but never yet conquered ire at the misuse of the Phantom--specifically, the fact that once again he is way too old to be alive at this point--rose to the fore. You see, there's a conundrum over exactly how old Erik would have to be in this story, because I can't for the love of little green apples tell what time period the blasted thing's set in. First, I thought that the flashlights would peg it as set closer to modern times, but then I looked it up and found that Eveready was making flashlights for commercial sale as early as 1898. Okay, so scratch that; technically, flashlights could be period (though they were a complete failure initially and wouldn't have been very common), but since they weren't invented until 1896, the very youngest Erik could be would be around 65, probably closer to 75. Okay. That's... doable, I guess, though improbable (consider an old guy in Victorian times living in a cave by himself without the benefit of modern medicine). Then, when one of the archaeologists made reference to his record collection, and of course I thought again that this must be set in later times; but, of course, the phonograph was invented in 1877, so even if it'd be rather surprising for an archaeologist to have a large opera record collection in 1896 or so, it'd be possible (though, again, various turns of phrase such as "classical music records" make little sense, since our umbrella conception of classical music differs vastly from what would have been available in the late 19th century). But then, someone mentions how a lot of caves like this were discovered in the late nineteenth century.

AHA.

So it is no longer the nineteenth century! I have you dead to rights, Millstead. At the earliest probable time, the year could be 1910-ish, which would make Erik somewhere in the 80 to 90 range. I do not, personally, know very many elderly 80s and 90s aged people who have the energy or the wherewithal to be assaulting and killing people in the underbelly of the earth, even with modern medical advancements. And, honestly, who am I kidding? This shit is clearly meant to be set in the present day (or the 80's, so close enough). I believe in giving the benefit of the doubt, but this is silly. I highly doubt the author put as much effort into the time period as I just did, and I'm not exactly the most meticulous and driven of researchers. So what we have here, again, is an Erik probably over 100 to even 150 years old. I cannot express how much I hate it when authors do this without making the Phantom supernatural in some way. If he were a real phantom, or a ghost of some sort, or a demon, or hell, a superhero... okay, maybe. But just a guy who happens to live a long time? No. This does not happen. His later statement that he's going to need a lifetime to complete his new opera and that he is happy to dedicate his "remaining years" to the project, implying that he will eventually expire of old age, just makes the mess all the much more inexcusable.

The coincidence factor in this story is a little bit overpowering, as well. The white woman haunting the cave turns out to be Giselle Marchant, a French opera singer who went missing some years ago (I'm sure no one can guess why). Not only does the remaining archaeologist, Wrenfeld, know her and listen to her records every night (which I would get bored with, but hey, different strokes), but he instantly recognizes her voice when she's singing--even though he's far from the comfort of his living room, her voice would sound distorted on a recording, and there are probably enough crazy acoustics going on in that cave to make anyone sound different than they usually do. He might as well have said, "I recognized your voice at once. The author needed me to in order to avoid messy exposition that might have slowed down the nonsensical action." At any rate, Giselle begs him to rescue her from the Phantom's clutches, and my sadness increased as Wrenfeld immediately accepted not only that she needed rescuing, but believed that she was being held captive by THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA, who is apparently real, immortal, and for some COMPLETELY RANDOM REASON in a cave under the Pyrennes. I mean, because this story doesn't make any sense, all of that is TRUE, but that doesn't mean rational people shouldn't question it a wee tiny bit.

Alas, Giselle turns out to be a double agent, and she leads Wrenfeld the wrong way and dumps him off in Erik's new lair, where the Phantom is wearing an animal pelt from "some black-horned creature that could have existed only far back in the mists of time" all over himself. I don't think Millstead was going for snigger-inducing here. I think it was supposed to convey earthy grandeur, but I had to go for the snort-laugh. Also, I have difficulty figuring out how a creature that could have existed only far back in the mists of time would have left an intact skin for Erik to prance around in. I was under the impression that critters that have been dead for centuries usually decay and are not wearable by the casual yet discriminating Phantom.

Then the Phantom spent some time soliloquizing about the birth of art and how he was going to write the best opera EVAR and how humanity is stupid and also, the birth of art some more. I wept for what could have been. Then he informed Wrenfeld that he was now the captive "test audience" for the best opera EVAR and the story came to a mercifully swift end.

(As a side note, can I say that it amuses me that his name is Wrenfeld, since Giselle is the one who resembles Renfield from Stoker's Dracula with her fanatical devotion to the creepy evil master? Am I the only one? Well, okay, then.)

How cool could this have been if it had been done as a completely reinvented retelling instead of just a reprise? A primeval Phantom, the last vestige of an ancient race or a powerful creature beyond our scope of understanding, living in the bowels of the earth? So cool! It could have been so awesome! But then... then, it wasn't, and I was very, very disappointed. There was no point to this little story; it had some lovely imagery, but no morals, no themes, no story, and no purpose. It was just a what-if, and a what-if doesn't make a story by itself. You have to add a plot.

Also: "labyrinthian" is not a word. I believe you're reaching for "labyrinthine". So close, yet so far away! 

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