In the Shadows of Paris (5 page)

‘I'll never marry, Ajax. I'll have mistresses, but I won't become attached to any of them; they'll suffer. Oh, roll your eyes all you like – you're not the marrying kind either! It's just not worth it. What's that? Be magnanimous? Forgive and forget? That's what she wants! Never, do you hear! I'll never join the ranks of the cuckolds. If you read more you'd know that
woman is fickle, men must beware.
¹⁶
This affair has already caused me to neglect my second novel and leave Frida von Glockenspiel in the lurch…
¹⁷
I refuse to give up literature! Eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die,' he concluded in a mournful voice as Ajax descended to explore the depths of the pond.

He rose to his feet, dejected, and continued his soliloquy, hoping to blot out the pain of his broken heart.

‘And to think that palm reader told me I was blessed by Venus. What twaddle! Anyway, I prefer it this way. I value my independence.'

His heart was pounding and his eyes were moist with tears. He dried them furiously. Between him and his resolve stood the shadow of a young woman with almond eyes who filled him with a passionate longing.

 

A woman cyclist in a hazel-coloured homemade outfit of shorts gathered just below the knee and a waisted bodice that highlighted her plump figure rode into Quai Malaquais. She slowed to a halt outside 18, Rue des Saints-Pères. She was preparing to dismount when she noticed a row of faces peering out at her from the Elzévir bookshop. There was a slight kerfuffle before the cyclist was dragged inside.

‘How can you be so reckless, Fräulein Becker?' cried Victor.

‘Have you suddenly become just like all those male misogynists, Monsieur Legris? A bicycle means freedom for a woman. It is a legitimate way of escaping the supervision of her family. It also gives her an opportunity to modify her dress, which is why men like you frown on women cyclists. You're afraid we'll wear the trousers. Will you please let go of my bicycle!'

‘You've got it all wrong, Mademoiselle Becker,' Victor assured her, grasping her bicycle with both hands and wheeling it to the back of the shop. ‘It's nothing to do with that.'

‘What is it to do with then? Monsieur Mori?'

Kenji Mori took refuge next to the fireplace.

‘The body of a man killed during the clashes in the Latin Quarter yesterday has just been taken to Hôpital de la Charité,' he replied, placing a hand on the bust of Molière.

‘I was there, I walked slap bang into a squad of municipal guards coming out of Rue Jacob,' bleated Euphrosine Pignot. ‘I said to myself: “The Uhlans are coming. It's the Siege all over again!”'

She pointed accusingly at Kenji.

‘And to think you sent my boy on an errand today of all days! He'll be massacred.'

‘We were unaware of how serious things were – this was supposed to be a peaceful procession. Don't worry, Joseph can take care of himself,' mumbled Kenji.

‘Cold-hearted, that's what you are,' muttered Euphrosine. ‘I saw the students in a semicircle outside the hospital gates holding their canes end to end. The sergeant raised his white glove and gave the order to charge. I didn't hang about – I ran straight here,' she told Helga Becker, who had taken off her Tyrolean hat and was busy straightening her braids.

‘
Ach, ja, das ist wirklich,
¹⁸
Madame Pignot, soldiers are a threat to women's virtue. Incidentally, Monsieur Legris, are you happy with your new Swift Cycle?'

‘I hardly think this is the right time…'

Victor hurried to open the door to a man in an opera hat, whom he greeted with great reverence, like an honoured guest.

‘Please, come in, Monsieur France. What news?'

‘The protestors, about a hundred and fifty of them, were perched on the hospital railings. The police from the sixth arrondissement made them get down and the mounted guards of the 4th Brigade gave the charge. Can you hear? They're clearing the streets right now.'

The sound of thundering hooves grew louder.

‘I'd advise you to bolt the door,' said Anatole France.

Outside, people were scattering in all directions; some flattened themselves against the walls, others fled towards the river Seine pursued by mounted guards waving sabres. The riders' costumes formed a red streak merging with the black and bay horses. Victor, strangely detached, wished he had a chronophotographic camera to capture these events in motion.
¹⁹

Silence descended once more, punctuated by an occasional distant sound. Rue des Saints-Pères was strewn with canes, hats and shoes, evidence of the violent nature of the clashes.

‘This situation bears some similarities to July 1789, when the people of Paris learnt of Necker's dismissal – the French Revolution, what a marvellous subject. Who knows, I may write a novel about it one day,'
²⁰
said Anatole France. ‘Kenji, dear fellow, what's become of the chairs?'

‘Revolution!' cried Euphrosine. ‘Holy Mother of God! And my boy's out there all alone! He'll be torn to shreds. Jesus, Mary and Joseph, bring him back to me alive!'

 

No sooner had Joseph reached Rue de Vaugirard than the noise from Boulevard Saint-Germain became audible again. He was enjoying the gentle breeze, when suddenly he screwed up his eyes at what looked like plumes of filthy smoke curling above the rooftops at the other end of Rue Monsieur-le-Prince. It was clear from where he was standing a few blocks away that this was no small fire. He raced towards the blaze, turning his face away from the bursts of heat. A faded four-storey building stood above two shops. Enveloped by flames, the colours on the shop signs had turned acid yellow. Joseph stopped dead in his tracks. The bookbinder's premises were by now a roaring inferno, which had begun to spread to the storehouse next door. A frail hand squeezed his arm and a hoarse voice made him jump.

‘I was having a kip while my mates were at the bistro having lunch and I had a dream. Yes, Monsieur, I dreamt I could smell burning and it woke me up. I'd be a goner otherwise!'

The man staggered off to join the other tenants on the pavement opposite. They stood, motionless, surveying the scene of devastation in silence, grey confetti raining down on their heads.

Joseph went over to an old man in a workman's smock.

‘How did the fire start?'

‘Dunno. I was having a snack at the cheese seller's with my workers when we heard a bang and suddenly the whole lot went up in flames. Lucky we weren't inside,' he said, pointing to the storehouse.

‘What about Monsieur Andrésy? Have you seen him?'

The old man shook his head.

Joseph searched in vain for the bookbinder among the people who'd escaped the blaze, but he was nowhere to be seen.

‘This is terrible! What if he's trapped inside?'

The man shrugged helplessly.

Joseph suddenly felt sick and leant against the wall.

‘He's dead,' he wailed.

He wiped his face and hands with a handkerchief.

‘Here's the fire brigade at last!' a woman cried.

The firemen with their extending ladders, hook ladders, ropes and pumps formed a team of muscle and machine to fight the blaze. A fireman grabbed a slack hose and his sub-officer signalled to the man in charge of working the steam pump. The hose jerked into life, its spirals slowly unwinding on the pavement, water spurting at intervals from its nozzle.

It took more than two hours to bring the blaze under control. A blackened frame was all that remained of the bookbinder's shop and apartment.

Head down, Joseph took advantage of the general confusion to step over the charred threshold. The books had been reduced to a soggy mass of cinders. He picked up a scrap of leather, which fell apart in his hands. He found three burnt tubes about four inches in length and, without thinking, put them in his pocket, then he went up to the owner of the storehouse.

‘Are you sure you heard an explosion?'

‘Well, I suppose it could have been those blasted students. What a disaster! Now we're out of a job. What the blazes will we do?'

‘It could have been a gas explosion,' ventured a woman with a beaky nose.

‘Have you seen Monsieur Andrésy?'

‘The poor fellow was trapped inside,' the woman replied. ‘My charcuterie is just opposite. I can see everything from my window. He was leaning over his press when the fire started. It's terrible, and with all that paper in there…'

 

The Elzévir bookshop had ceased to be a temporary refuge. The customers filed out, and Anatole France followed, escorted by Kenji. Only Fräulein Becker resisted venturing out on her bicycle until the rioters were fully under control. She said she would go to the top of the Ferris Tension Wheel – the pièce de résistance at the Chicago World's Fair
²¹
– sooner than expose herself and her precious machine to the dangers of the arsonists and the forces of order.

Much to Victor's annoyance, Madame Ballu, the concierge at number 18, burst in, eager to exchange impressions with her friend Euphrosine. The three women, like the three Fates, were standing at the counter prattling away when suddenly they cried out in unison at the sight of Joseph in the doorway, his face flushed, his cap askew. Before he could say a word, his mother had flung her arms round him, thanking all the saints for having brought her son back in one piece.

‘My poor boy, you're all out of breath! Did the brigands chase you? I told you, didn't I, Monsieur Legris, they're nothing but a pack of wild animals! Look at the poor lad! He's dripping with sweat!'

‘Maman!'

‘Calm down, Madame Pignot, he's not going to dissolve in a puddle,' retorted Victor, prising his clerk from his mother's grasp.

‘B-boss, it…it's terrible! Monsieur Andrésy…The bookbinder…He's dead! Burnt alive!'

‘Oh, God help us, those monsters are setting fire to people now!' howled Madame Ballu.

Victor tried to usher Joseph to the back of the shop, but the three excited women blocked their way.

‘Let the boy speak!' thundered Victor.

‘Some say it was the students, some the anarchists, others think it was an accident, but for the moment they're groping in the dark, clueless, flummoxed,' exclaimed Joseph, who had recovered the use of his tongue.

‘Flummoxed?' asked Helga Becker.

‘In the
schwarz
,' barked Victor.

‘There was a fire, a huge fire. The place was burnt to the ground!' concluded Joseph.

‘I'll go there straight away. You stay and look after the shop, and not a word to Monsieur Mori about this,' warned Victor, pulling on his jacket and reaching for his hat and cane.

‘What shall I do if Mademoiselle Iris asks where you've gone?' murmured Euphrosine, glancing at Joseph.

‘Remain as quiet as the doe in the hunter's sights,' Victor commanded, with an inward nod of approval to Alphonse de Lamartine for this fitting aphorism.

Madame Pignot wrinkled her mouth, flattered by the comparison. Joseph stood motionless, his gaze fixed on the beautiful half-Asian young woman in a red and white striped chiffon dress and silk ruff fastened with a black ribbon.

‘What are you worried that I might ask, Madame Pignot?' enquired Iris, her eyes sparkling.

 

As he was trying to hail a cab, Victor recalled the strange creature who had caused such a sensation at the Folies-Bergère the previous winter. That will-o'-the-wisp in gossamer veils, flapping like a butterfly in the projectors' coloured beams, reminded him of his own life. His routine was occasionally interrupted by complex choreographies
à la
Loïe Fuller;
²²
he cavorted with the unknown, tussled with danger, only to fall back, exhausted, into the clutches of an ennui that had been the bane of his life. Only Tasha had the power to draw him out of these depressions and give his life meaning.

The traffic was inching forward. There wasn't a cab in sight. He decided to walk. Having finally left the hubbub on Boulevard Saint-Germain, he reached Rue Monsieur-le-Prince, where he came across a sign:

ROAD CLOSED

He walked round it and arrived at what had once been the bookbinder's shop. The firemen's hoses had transformed the charred rubble into a boggy mess. A crack, like a grinning mouth, had spread across the wall of the adjoining building. The remains of books and half-burnt pages lay strewn across the pavement where somebody had left a pile of chairs and a trunk.

‘Any victims?' he asked a policeman on watch.

‘Fortunately, the men at the storehouse were having lunch at Fulbert's when the fire broke out!'

‘What about the bookbinder?'

‘He wasn't so lucky – burnt alive.'

‘He was a friend of mine.'

‘According to the firemen what's left of him is not a pretty sight.'

Victor shuddered inwardly; burning your finger with a match was bad enough…imagine the agony of being consumed by fire! He could only hope that Pierre Andrésy had been overcome by fumes first.

‘Does anybody know how it started?'

‘The firemen think a gas lamp probably blew out, and the poor wretch lit a pipe or a cigarette and boom! The inspector and the coroner will accompany the body to the morgue, but with all the to-do in the neighbourhood it'll take time.'

‘I assume there'll be an investigation?'

‘We're expecting the detectives to arrive at any moment.'

While they were talking, Victor surreptitiously stepped over the rope cordoning off the area around the shop. The policeman held him back by his sleeve.

‘You can't go in there, Monsieur. You might destroy vital evidence.'

‘I'm terribly upset. I just wanted to make sure that…'