by Felice Arena
‘These men say that crocodiles have escaped from the zoo and are swimming in the Seine,’ Thierry says, writing frantically in his notebook. ‘You couldn’t make things like this up!’
‘Only two crocodiles,’ corrects one of the zoo officials. ‘We already got one back, but we still need to capture Beatrice.’
‘Beatrice? Really? Beatrice the crocodile – brilliant!’ Thierry scribbles frantically.
Frederic watches as the other two boats filled with zoo workers and firefighters corral the crocodile. It’s not long before they’ve captured Beatrice with the help of large fishing nets and hooped ropes.
‘Well, our first rescue will be hard to top, n’est-ce pas? Right?’ Claire says to Frederic and Thierry. She’s holding a much calmer Renoir in her arms and drying him with the blanket. ‘So what’s next, big hero?’
‘What do you mean, what’s next?’ asks Frederic, as they’re dropped off in a non-flooded street.
‘Who or what are we going to rescue next?’ Claire says. ‘We’re not going to stop now, are we?’
‘No, no, we can’t stop!’ Thierry blurts. ‘This is just the beginning for the Crocodile Crusaders.’
He looks up hopefully to see what the others think of the name.
Claire shakes her head.
Frederic sighs.
He shrugs. ‘Anyway if we’re really going to help those in trouble in this flood we’re going to need a boat.’
‘Simple!’ Claire grins as they approach the entrance of the Saint Nicholas shelter. ‘I know where we can get one.’
Frederic struggles to sleep in the shelter. It’s cold, bitterly cold. And trying to sleep with several hundred people crammed in the same space isn’t easy.
Most people are wrapped in blankets. Many are huddled together by the heating stations that have been set up throughout the hall – makeshift ovens with cut-out holes and burning kindling inside.
It’s dawn, and Frederic hops up from his bed, sneaks past his mother, and makes his way to warm his hands by one of the heating stations. He spots Thierry on the other side of the hall. Thierry smiles and carefully walks around the sleeping people on the floor to join him.
‘Bonjour, mon ami! Good morning, my friend!’ Thierry whispers. ‘I slept so well. Did you?’
Frederic shakes his head. ‘No,’ he says, ‘How could you, with all the snoring, coughing and farting?’
‘I could even sleep through a thunderstorm,’ Thierry says, rubbing his hands and breathing into his palms. ‘I like waking up early too. I’d be getting ready for school now, but my school is closed, at least until the flood is over. What about you, do you go to school?’
Frederic tells Thierry how he now works, or at least used to work. Thierry is a year younger and in his final year at primary school.
‘Hey! Enough gas-bagging. Let’s go!’
It’s Claire, popping up out of nowhere.
‘Where did you come from?’ Frederic asks, looking back over his shoulder. ‘Where did you sleep? I tried to find you last night but couldn’t see you anywhere.’
‘Well, I was here,’ says Claire. ‘At the other end of the hall.’
‘With your mother? Is she going to work today?’ Thierry asks.
‘What is this? An interrogation?’ Claire snaps. ‘Maman sells flowers at Les Halles market. She’s already gone for the day. I thought we agreed that first thing this morning I would take you to get a boat. What are we waiting for? Let’s go see who needs our help! Oh, and here, one each . . .’
Claire takes two small baguettes out of a paper bag and hands one each to Frederic and Thierry.
‘Where’d you get these?' asks Thierry. ‘They’re still warm!’
‘More questions?’ says Claire. ‘Well, if you must know I got them from a bakery giving out free bread to flood victims. It’s their way of doing something for those in need.’ She grins. ‘Why am I even explaining this to you? Come on.’
___
‘Are we there yet?’ Thierry complains.
‘If you ask me that one more time, I’m going to dunk you into the river,’ Claire tells him.
Frederic has convinced them that they should visit the Pont d’Alma to take a look at the water level of the river.
He gasps when he sees the river. The water rushing under the bridge is now flowing up to the chest of the Zouave soldier statue.
They cross the bridge onto the Left Bank and backtrack along the river towards the Gare d’Orsay.
Frederic is in awe of the lavish train station and its immense columns, grand arches, and vast barrel-shaped dome ceiling.
But he’s aghast to see that it is mostly underwater.
A large crowd of onlookers stream in to take a look.
Frederic, Thierry and Claire wait their turn like tourists and eventually reach the front of the crowd. It looks less like a station and more like a giant swimming pool. All the tracks are completely submerged.
‘Come on, this way,’ instructs Claire, leading Frederic and Thierry back outside.
Claire takes the boys a couple of blocks past the station, down a narrow laneway and through a hole in a wooden gate in a stone wall. When they pop out the other side, they find themselves in the middle of a junkyard filled with old train carriages, horsewagons, scrap metal and clumps of wood – most of it underwater.
Claire heads directly for one of the train carriages. She steps inside and the boys cautiously follow. Lying on the aisle of the carriage is a small rowboat, with one oar inside. There are a couple of blankets folded up inside the boat – as if someone has been sleeping there.
‘How did you even know this was here?’ asks Thierry. ‘You’ve obviously been here before. Why? Why would you want to come to a junkyard like this?’
‘Why do you ask so many questions?’ Claire snaps.
Thierry shrugs, but his questions make Frederic look at Claire in a new light. For the first time he notices how mismatched her clothes are – her coat is a size too big and her boots look as if they were made for a boy. Her dress is frayed at the hem. Her brown hair is done up in a bun, but loosely, as if she did it in a rush or doesn’t have enough pins to hold it all together – she has wispy bits hanging across her face.
‘Are we going to use this boat or what?’ she adds.
The boys nod.
Claire directs them to help her drag the boat out of the junkyard and down towards the flooded streets. Once they get to water deep enough, they hop aboard, wobbling a little as they find their balance.
Frederic gets the hang of it in no time and starts paddling with the single oar.
‘Yes!’ cries Thierry excitedly. ‘We’re rowing – in the city! We’re the Rowing Renegades of Paris! What do you think? Catchy, no?’
Frederic laughs and shakes his head.
‘No!’ Claire says.
The three paddle around the streets, looking for people who might need their help. No one needs rescuing, but they end up providing taxi rides. They transport a lady with a bag filled with kindling to her home on the second floor of an apartment. They offer a ride to a man and his dog. They cart a musician and his cello to his music studio on a hill. And a Swiss tourist offers them one whole franc just for a joyride.
‘So much for being heroes,’ sighs Claire. ‘We’re nothing but a transport and sightseeing service. Boooor-ing.’
‘Yes, this can’t compare with saving defenceless cats from the snapping jaws of marauding crocodiles,’ Thierry adds.
‘Said like a true writer!’ Frederic grins, continuing to paddle.
‘Oh no!’ cries Thierry. ‘Look! We have to rescue them!’
Up ahead hundreds of books are floating and bobbing up and down the street.
Thierry leans over the side of the boat and begins scooping up as many as he can grab. Claire assists him, tossing one waterlogged volume after another into the bottom of the boat.
‘Oh my lord!’ Thierry panics. ‘The greatest French writers of our time are drowning!’
> Frederic thinks Thierry’s reaction is a bit over the top. He’s never met anyone so in love with books before. ‘Not too many!’ he says. ‘We’ll sink!’
‘It’s Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables!’ says Thierry in a choked voice, trying to fan out the wet pages of the novel. ‘And there’s Flaubert’s Madame Bovary! And Stendahl’s Le Rouge et le Noir! And . . .’
The shops lining the streets here are still busy with people – bakeries and cafés are operating and boards have been added, joining the shops to the passerelles in the street, so people can come in without getting their feet wet.
Over Thierry’s shoulder, Frederic spots a man stepping out from a café.
He’s familiar, but Frederic can’t place him. As he rows closer the man looks up, and it suddenly hits him.
It’s the thief from the Louvre!
Frederic drops the oar and lunges out of the boat. He hardly hears Claire and Thierry calling after him or feels the biting cold of the water as he splashes across the flooded street, his heart racing and his teeth clenched.
The man turns a corner into another street, but by the time Frederic reaches the corner the man is nowhere to be seen.
Where did he go?
Frederic wades to the middle of the road, feeling frantic. He looks back and forth, scanning the windows of cafés and restaurants.
Pedestrians shuffling single file along the passerelles are staring at him, bemused.
‘Get out of the water, you fool!’ a man says.
Frederic is overwhelmed. ‘NO! NO! NO!’ he mutters. He sighs heavily, feeling lost and angry and unsure of what to do next.
‘Hey!’ Claire cries, as she and Thierry finally catch up to him. ‘What’s going on?’
Frederic wipes the tears from his eyes and turns back to face them. He wonders if he has imagined it all.
But it was him, he tells himself. He had the same streak of white running through his hair.
‘Are you okay?’ Claire asks, as she glides the boat up along Frederic, who is now shivering, waist-deep in the water.
‘Yeah,’ he lies, as they pull him back into the rowboat.
‘Who were you chasing after?’ asks Thierry. ‘You look really upset. What’s happening? Can you tell us?’
‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have bolted like that,’ Frederic says. ‘I might explain later, but I can’t right now.’
Frederic feels Claire watching him closely as Thierry paddles back towards the books.
‘Hello!’ cries a woman standing in the water in front of the bookstore. She is waving to them. ‘We saw you saving some of our books.’
The owners of the bookstore introduce themselves to Frederic and his friends as Monsieur and Madame Martin. They have been away and have only just returned. When they opened the door to their flooded store, the books floated out into the street.
‘I’m afraid it’s too late to save them,’ says Madame Martin. ‘But thank you for trying. Come upstairs and have some lunch.’
In the apartment above the shop, Madame Martin makes some hot onion soup and Frederic dries himself by the gas oven.
Thierry is so excited that he can’t stop talking.
‘Have you read every single book in your store? Is that even possible? I know I would!’ he says excitedly. ‘I spend so much time at the Sainte Genevieve library. That’s where I read most of my books. One day I hope my novel will end up on the shelves of every library and bookstore. I’m going to write a story about the flood and my adventures with my two friends here.’
‘Oh, how wonderful,’ says Madame Martin, placing some bread on the table. ‘Henri, did you hear that? We have a writer at our table.’
‘Yes, yes, I heard,’ says Monsieur Martin. ‘And a modest one too!’ he says, winking at Frederic and Claire.
There is a knock at the door and as Madame Martin answers it, Frederic sees a police officer standing there.
His heart almost stops. His mind instantly goes back to his father lying on the floor, motionless. He relives the experience of running across the museum to find another guard. And the time spent back by his father’s side waiting for the police.
He hoped they would help him, but they had taken him away and he’d never seen his father again. They kept him at the station and asked him to repeat what happened again and again – relentless questioning but ultimately nothing came of it. No leads, nothing.
The officer at the door, dressed smartly in a navy blue woollen tunic with silver buttons and a cape and cap, is asking questions about the rowboat tied up below and the Martins let him in so Frederic and his friends can answer.
‘No one owns it,’ Thierry blurts, causing Claire to glare at him. ‘We found it in a junkyard. Actually Claire found it.’
Claire shoots another look at Thierry and shakes her head at Frederic as if to say, ‘Oh la vache! Holy cow! He has a big mouth!’
‘So you did steal the boat?’ asks the officer, taking out a writing pad from his pocket.
‘No!’ Frederic says. ‘We . . . um, no. We didn’t steal it. We didn’t think anyone owned it so I guess we were just borrowing it, so we could help people in trouble.’
‘It’s true, officer,’ Madame Martin says. ‘Don’t be hard on them. These kids tried to do a good deed for us.’
‘Oooh, I like that,’ says Thierry, pulling out his notebook and pencil and scribbling. Over his shoulder Frederic sees him write The Good Deed Trio.
‘I won’t report you,’ the officer says. ‘But the boat is now the property of the Paris police. The city is under so much strain and I’ve spent the last couple of days chasing after looters. We need every boat we can muster. If it really isn’t stolen, I will contact you again after the floods have gone down. Or you can come to see me at my depot in Place de l’Opera. I’m Officer Pierre. What are your full names?’
‘Thierry Bonneville!’ Thierry says enthusiastically.
‘I’m Claire,’ says Claire. ‘Claire Fignon.’
‘And I’m Frederic Lefosse,’ adds Frederic.
‘Lefosse?’ the officer looks up from his notebook, interested. ‘Why do I know that name?’
He chews the end of his pencil thoughtfully.
‘That’s it!’ he cries. ‘Lefosse! A guard at the Louvre was killed trying to thwart a robbery last summer. The thieves got away with a Raphael painting. Was that Monsieur Lefosse any relation to you?’
Frederic freezes. Everyone is staring.
He looks at Claire. She looks at him as if she already knows the answer.
‘Yes,’ Frederic says softly. ‘Claude Lefosse was my father.’
Everyone is sympathetic and kind. But Frederic doesn’t want to talk about his father. Or that night in the Louvre. He contemplates telling Officer Pierre about having just spotted the thief earlier – but he has begun to doubt himself and he’s in no mood to be dragged to a station for more questioning.
He rushes Claire and Thierry to leave. Soon they say goodbye to the Martins and are back outside in the bleak wintry weather, walking in single file along the passerelles.
There’s silence for most of the way as they patiently stop and start and pass pedestrians on the gangplanks – although Frederic can tell that both Thierry and Claire are desperate to say something. He can feel their stares burning into the back of his head.
‘What?’ he suddenly stops and turns to face them. Thierry bumps into Frederic and almost falls off the planks. Claire grabs him and he regains his balance just in time.
‘Go on, say what you have to say!’ says Frederic.
‘We’re sorry, that’s all,’ Thierry says softly.
‘Yeah, we are,’ says Claire. ‘That man you chased after, did he have something to do with your father’s death?’
Frederic is taken aback by Claire’s directness. Not only does she have gumption, she’s also very sharp.
‘Yes.’ Frederic feels overcome with emotion. ‘I can’t stop thinking about it. It was him. I will never forget what he looks like. He was
the man who killed my father.’
‘What? No way.’ Thierry goes to grab his notebook from his jacket pocket, but is stopped by Claire slapping her hand on his chest.
‘Are you sure?’ asks Claire.
‘No, I can’t be sure he’s the man who killed my father, but he was there,’ says Frederic. ‘I wasn’t in the room – I should’ve been! I should’ve been there to save him, but I wasn’t.’
‘Why didn’t you say something to the officer?’ Claire asks.
‘I don’t really know why,’ says Frederic bitterly. ‘But even if I had, it wouldn’t have made any difference. You think the police can help you, Claire, but they can’t. They don’t.’
Suddenly Frederic hears a scream. It sounds as though it’s coming from the next street.
Without hesitation Frederic, Claire and Thierry swing into action. They jump off the passerelles, splash through the watery rue de Grenelle and dart into one of the high dry streets, the rue du Bac.
A woman is holding onto a baby and is standing crying over an open manhole. There are other people gathering, but no one seems to be doing anything.
‘My boy has fallen,’ she sobs. ‘He’s only little! Oh, dear God, help me! It might be too late.’
Frederic pushes past some of the gawkers in front of him and runs to the open manhole. He looks into the darkness below and scrambles down the iron ladder attached to the side of the narrow shaft. Halfway down he begins to hear faint cries for help.
At the bottom of the shaft is a large brick sewer tunnel, and running through it is a raging stream of water. Frederic climbs down the ladder until half of his body is submerged beneath the wild rapids. He tightens his grip on the ladder, and looks across the tunnel – but it’s dark and difficult to see. After a moment Frederic’s eyes adjust and he sees the boy.
On the same side of the tunnel, about three metres down from Frederic, the boy is in the water gripping precariously to another iron ladder attached to the tunnel wall.
The boy’s face is only just above the water. He sees Frederic and his eyes widen. He bursts into tears – and Frederic can see that he won’t be able to hold on much longer.
