The murder of Count Philippe

[igenlode]

Philippe's murder in Leroux is odd -- about fifty per cent of it really takes place in the prologue, really, at a point where the reader doesn't know or particularly care who any of these characters are (which is where we get the whole 'two ever-loving brothers in tragic conflict' thing). Yet after this dramatic set-up, when we eventually get to the scene in question the death and its consequences are almost airbrushed out. All the after-effects and the business about Raoul being suspected are only mentioned at the *start* of the story, not when the actual murder takes place. It's as if the author originally intended his finale to be much more of a Chagny-centric thriller plot, and then got distracted by the Phantom's woes ;-p

And then Erik denies the murder when the Daroga accuses him, despite the fact that Leroux definitely seems to intend 'the siren' to have killed a then-unknown intruder during the relevant chapter. We know (from his own lips) that Erik lies whenever it suits him, but it's not clear why he would bother to lie about that on his deathbed... but then it's not clear why he would have lied about the drowning being "the siren's fault" earlier on, either. Given that he comes back soaked from head to foot, I think we can conclude that he did his best to pull the same 'reed-breathing' trick on the Comte that Leroux shows him doing when he almost drowns the Daroga -- in fact, that may well be the purpose of that event in the novel, to prefigure Philippe's death (which, as I said, appears originally to have been trailed as the pivotal plot point of the story, only to get almost completely brushed over in the finished serial!)

So even if Philippe did, in a strictly literal interpretation of events, fall into the lake and drown there 'by accident', at the very least Erik headed out there underwater with the *intention* of killing him. And the all-too-obvious interpretation is that any 'accident' took place by Erik's direct contrivance :-(