T-I-G LV Sing when you're winning

[Mithalwen]

After the solemn departure of Menel and Nogrod the other singers retired to their dressing rooms, most to sleep -(one perchance to dream!), one went aspying and three went a plotting. The cloaked and masked Critics at last decided who their victim should be this night and went to their victim's dressing room.

It's occupant was not sleeping but sang a plangent and appropriate aria:

Pastorello d'un povero armento,
pur dorme contento,
sotto l'ombra d'un faggio o d'alloro.
Io, d'un teatro monarca fastoso,
non trovo riposo,
sotto l'ombra di porpora e d'oro.


The beauty of his voice did not stop the critics from making their barbed attacks but to their suprise their jibes did not have the desired effect. The door opened to reveal the Phantom.

"Fools, do you think you can hurt me? Do you think you can make me leave here?"

"What do you mean" demanded the Critics as they pursued him down the stairs and passages of the opera house while making futile and snide comments about his tessitura. He did not respond until he reached the banks of the underground river - a grotto really created by the sea in a chasm of the rock on which Dol Amroth was built. He stepped in to a small boat and cast off.

"Do you mean you are the divo?" , cried the critics.

"You need to ask? You knew I was the Phantom of the Opera! Yes I was a divo but I am not THE Divo. I am the Opera Ghost ."

"Err what does that mean exactly" asked one of the confused critics.

"It means you can't get rid of me, only disenfranchise me" he replied " I won't be able to vote but I am not going anywhere".