Dream Paris (25 page)

I’d joined a band and marched into a park along with a bunch of other kids. What would my mother think of that? I knew the answer. She’d think I was a fool.

“You think there’s something wrong with that, Anna?”

His words surprised me. There was a glint in his eye. He didn’t often challenge me, he left me to do my own thing. Obviously I’d touched on something important to him.

“I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that. I marched with the band, remember?”

“Yes, you fought for your country.”

“Not for my country, no. I fought because it was right. And I’m not a soldier. I don’t know if I could kill someone…”

“What if someone were to attack you in the street?”

“I’d run away.”

“What if you had to kill one person to save five people?”

“I’d kill them. That’s nothing to do with patriotism. That’s just logic.”

“What if you saw Adolf Hitler raping your grandmother?”

I began to giggle. Partly hysteria at my situation, partly because of the question.

“What’s so funny?”

“They say that, don’t they? I never thought about it before. What sort of bizarre train of circumstances could possibly have led to Adolf Hitler invading England, ignoring all the women available in London and making a beeline for Worcester and my grandmother?”

He laughed. There, marooned on a roundabout in the middle of Dream Paris, we both laughed together. We laughed so much we had tears in our eyes.

“I suppose it does seem a little unlikely,” he agreed.

And there, for the first time since that night I’d overheard him discussing me with his friends back in Mundane London, I really warmed to him. I saw the human side to him. Maybe he wasn’t so bad after all, part of me admitted.

S
OMEONE WAS CALLING
to us. A young man and woman, hurrying up behind us.

“Excuse me!”

“Yes?”

The young couple ran up. They were dressed in the blue serge trousers and jackets of the Dream Parisian workers.

“You’re English, right? We heard you talking.”

“Yes,” I said. “We’re English.”

The man squeezed his partner’s hand.

“You’re newly arrived here, aren’t you? You’ve come from London. Real London!”

“That’s right.”

They looked at each other.

“Then it’s true! You’ve brought the road back home with you!”

I turned and looked at the wire stretching out behind Francis. It wrapped its way around the Public Records Office building, tracing our wanderings.

“Well, yes. I suppose we have. But I warn you, it’s a long way…”

“It doesn’t matter!” said the woman. “It’s a path. We were lost. We didn’t know which way to go!”

“Who are you?”

“Oh, I’m sorry. It’s been so long.”

She stretched out a hand.

“Jane Hardman. I used to live in Barking. I was a teacher, that was before…” Her voice trailed off.

“Steve Orlowski,” said the man. “From Putney.”

He used his left hand to shake mine, his right remained in his pocket.

“Were you a teacher too?” I asked.

“Me? Oh, no. I owned a restaurant. Jane and I didn’t know each other back in… we met here…”

“In Dream Paris?”

“Dream Paris?” said Jane, looking up. “No! Not Dream Paris! We ran to Dream Paris from the manufactories!”

The manufactories. I’d heard that term back in Dream London. Another name for the workhouse.

Jane shuddered, spoke in a low voice. “You don’t know what it’s like. Sleep in a single-sex dormitory, too tired to speak. Bussed from Clichy to work all day on the machines, surrounded by people but lonely. Oh, so lonely! Excuse me…” She pressed a hand to her mouth. Steve gripped her other hand, he made no other move to comfort her. He was shaking too, I noticed.

“You escaped from the manufactories and you chose to come to Dream Paris?” Francis couldn’t keep the surprise from his voice. “Why? This place is a prison. It’s run by revolutionaries.”

“You’re a soldier,” said Jane, eyes narrowing suspiciously.

“How can you tell?”

“You stand up for the establishment.”

“Why do you say that?”

“You don’t like revolutionaries.”

“Only the bad ones.”

“How do you know which ones are the bad ones?”

“They’re the ones who don’t believe in freedom.”

“The people here fought for freedom. Just like the French did in our world.”

“We didn’t have a revolution in England.” Francis seemed to think he’d scored a point.

“Perhaps we should have done,” answered Jane.

“The people of England didn’t want revolution,” said Francis. “They fought against it. What about Waterloo?” He smiled, obviously thinking he’d won. Jane shook her head.

“Don’t let anyone ever tell you that the common people of England fought against Napoleon. They
wanted
him to invade, he was the one they hoped would free them from their servitude.”

“Were you a history teacher, by any chance?” I asked. It didn’t matter. Jane was warming to her theme.

“All the way across Europe, the downtrodden welcomed Napoleon. But the rulers turned the working classes on themselves as they always do. They sent in the soldiers.”

“She worked in the East End,” said Steve, apologetically. “All the teachers there are lefties.”

“All soldiers support the established order,” said Jane.

“And those who don’t are labelled as spies,” I said.

“What’s up with your hand?” asked Francis. He was obviously irritated with being labelled a tool of the establishment, so he was changing the subject. Steve seemed pleased to go along with him.

“This? It’s what you get working in the manufactories.”

Steve held up a hand that looked as if it had been dipped in granulated sugar.

“We made car parts. You’ve got to be very precise with the measurements, and that’s the problem…”

“I don’t get it.”

“What’s five divided by two?” asked Steve

“It’s two and a ha – Two and…” Francis frowned. “It’s blue.”

I could see the confusion on his face. Dream Maths gives you vertigo, the first time you run up against it. It doesn’t get much better afterwards, to be honest.

“The Dream World doesn’t allow fractions,” I explained.

“But that’s ridiculous!”

“Don’t think about it. Trust me, I’ve been doing my best not to do that since I first came here. Your mind fills up with colours and other concepts. You start to think in different ways.”

“It can send you mad,” said Jane.

“The mathematicians back in Dream London committed suicide,” I said.

“But what happened to your hand?” asked Francis.

“I don’t know,” said Steve. “You try to measure parts in millimetres, but sometimes you need to think smaller than that and, I don’t know… This world doesn’t like it.”

I looked at the hand, wondering.

“Blue,” said Francis. He was frowning, trying to understand.

I was thinking about Petrina, falling dead in my kitchen, thinking about her pixellated eyes. Perhaps she had looked at something too small. Something that didn’t want to be a fraction.

Francis shook his head, clearing it.

“This is a distraction,” he said. “Listen. Why did you come looking for us? How did you know about us, anyway?”

Jane laughed.

“Know about you, when you’re dragging that line behind you? Half the city must know about you by now. If the rest doesn’t know by nightfall, I’d be surprised. Anyone wanting to find you just has to walk the streets until they find the wire. It’s almost like you want to advertise yourself.”

“Or someone wants us advertised,” I murmured.

“We first got wind of you in the
Café de la Chausette
. Someone came in rushing in, shaking fit to burst. It took two glasses of pastis before he was calm enough to talk about it. He said there was a line leading out of the city and across the countryside, a line that leads to another world. He said there was a man and a young woman walking through the city, bringing the line to the people. There was an argument. Some say it’s the road to freedom. Others say that we have freedom here, that good citizens should not be leaving Dream Paris and embracing the enemy. They say it’s a citizen’s duty to remain here and fight for the Revolution!”

“You’ve no idea the trouble your presence is causing,” said Steve.

I looked around. Were there people watching us from the sea of traffic that surrounded the island? People watching to see what we would do next?

“What are you going to do now?” I asked.

“Place one hand on the wire and follow it back to England,” said Jane.

“Good luck,” said Francis. He looked out at the road. “You’ll have to make it across there first.”

“We’ll hitch a lift. Pick it up at the other side.”

Hitch a lift. Why hadn’t we thought of that?

“Do you want to come with us?” asked Jane.

“You know a way off this place?” said Francis. “Sure.”

“I don’t think we’ll need it,” I said, looking at the vehicle that had pulled up nearby. Someone had got out and was walking towards us. “I think our lift has arrived.”

THE ABATTOIR

T
HE MAN WALKING
towards us was clearly German. You could tell by the moustache, the pointed helmet, the military stride. Stereotypes were deeply entrenched in the Dream World.

He came to a halt in front of us both and ripped off such a smart salute that I saw Francis half raise his own hand in response.

“Fräulein Anna Sinfield!” he barked. “Count von Breisach sends his compliments. It is his pleasure to offer you the use of his carriage in order to transport you to tonight’s duel.”

Francis shook his head in despair.

“Duel?” I said. “I thought we were having dinner.”

The man clapped his hand across his head. “Ach! How stupid of me! You will be having dinner! Please forgive my momentary lapse of memory! I am, of course, fully aware that duelling is forbidden in Dream Paris.”

“But we’re not duelling!”

“Exactly! We are guests in this city! It would not do to offend our hosts by going against their perfectly reasonable laws!”

I noticed the faint scar on the man’s cheek.

Francis spoke up. “We already have other plans for dinner.”

The young man’s eyes widened.

“Forgo dinner? But that would be the act of a coward! Who could hold their head up in any society if they were to back down from a du… a dinner invitation?”

The afternoon shadows were lengthening, the glare of the sun was fading and a sluggish heat was settling in. Evening was approaching. What else was I to do? Besides, this was a way off the roundabout…

“Oh, leave it, Francis. It’s only a meal. Besides, I’m not letting that arrogant bastard think he’s got the better of me. I’m willing to eat a few mouse pies in order to spite him.”

T
HE CARRIAGE TOOK
us through successively narrower streets into the poorer quarters of Paris. The buildings lining the streets were cracked and grey, covered in posters advertising concerts:
Le Jazz
,
Chopin
,
Eroica
. The homeless slept in the gaps between the tightly parked cars, they sat on sheets of cardboard, heads in their hands. The cafés and
tabacs
here were smaller and darker, the customers that sat outside dressed in blue and grey, red Phrygian caps on their heads. I saw them mutter and point. Once there was a sharp rap on the carriage, as if someone had thrown a stone at us. Eiffel Towers wrapped in rough grey bandage grew here and there from the wrecks of buildings.

“What’s up?” I asked Francis. He was gazing out of the window, frowning.

“That funny little green van back there. I think it might be following us.”

I looked at the wire whizzing from his backpack.

“I don’t think anyone would have to work too hard at that.”

We were heading towards the river, down into a region of warehouses and cranes. Turquoise ripples of light banded the buildings, reflections from the water. We passed the long body of a mosasaur, skeleton half exposed from the black and white body. A group of women, their skirts tied up above their knees, flensed it with axes and long knives. The carriage pulled up outside a huge wooden shed in a lot full of rubble. Francis read out loud the word written on the side

“Abattoir…”

We followed our German escort towards the building. There was a rank smell of old blood and flesh that made me want to vomit. Never mind actually eating mousemeat, the thought of eating
anything
here was enough to make me sick. The chatter of voices got louder as we entered the shed. A large crowd had gathered inside.

“What are they doing here?” asked Francis.

“They’ve come to spectate the du… the dinner!”

There was a roped-off path through the centre of the crowd. I walked down it to polite applause, heading for the table set out in the middle of the wide floor. The table was covered in a cloth decorated with green fig leaves and red berries and set with a mismatched dinner service, all good quality but no two items the same. A velvet rope had been strung at some distance around the table, keeping back the assembled crowd: mainly men in black tie, but with a large minority of women, all dressed for the occasion. More people sat on wooden bleachers set out around the walls.