Fearless Frederic

by Felice Arena

  ‘Twenty thousand!’ says Claire. ‘I’m sure there’s a huge reward out for this.’

  ‘It’s like something from an Émile Gaboriau or a Sherlock Holmes detective novel,’ says Thierry. ‘If we go to the police now and return the diamond to the authorities, they will catch your father’s killer and put him away for life.’

  Frederic stares down at the diamond – it’s a light-pink pear-shaped stone.

  ‘I’ve got a better plan,’ he says. He grabs Thierry’s notebook and pencil and rips out a page.

  If you want the diamond back, meet me at midnight at the Charlemagne statue in front of the Notre Dame Cathedral, Frederic writes. Come alone.

  ‘I can’t let you do this,’ Claire whispers. ‘I’m sorry about your father – we’ve all lost our fathers. But this isn’t some fantasy world like in one of the books Thierry reads. You’re putting yourself in danger . . . and for what? You’ll wind up dead.’

  ‘Exactement! Exactly!’ Thierry adds. ‘I don’t know what you think you’ll do when you meet this man, but it can’t end well. Please, Frederic. Can’t we just go back to saving cats from crocodiles?’

  ‘I’m going to tell someone,’ declares Claire.

  Thierry nods.

  Frederic feels his eyes beginning to sting and struggles to keep his tears at bay. They should be with me, he thinks. These are my friends. His breath quickens and his stomach churns. Why are they against me?

  ‘I wouldn’t be so quick to tell anyone, Thierry,’ he hisses. ‘Because I’ll tell the hotel manager that I got the room key from your mother and she will probably lose her job.’

  ‘You wouldn’t!’ says Thierry.

  ‘I would!’ Frederic tells him.

  ‘And if you tell, Claire,’ Frederic says. ‘I’ll tell the nuns at the shelter that you’re just a regular homeless person, not a flood victim. You shouldn’t be at the shelter – it’s for people with families and places to live. They don’t let the beggars in.’

  Claire stares at him, shocked.

  ‘That’s right, I know! You think I couldn’t work it out. You’re homeless. An orphan. This flood must be the best thing that’s happened to you – all that free food and board.’

  The spiteful words have just flown out of Frederic’s mouth and instantly he regrets what he’s said, but it’s too late to take them back.

  Thierry grabs his notebook and runs out the door.

  Claire goes to follow him, but before she does she turns back to face Frederic.

  ‘You’re right, of course,’ she says, her voice cracking. ‘This flood was the best thing that ever happened to me, but it wasn’t the free food or the roof over my head. It was you two. For the first time, I thought I had friends.’

  She closes the door behind her, leaving Frederic feeling like the worst person in the world.

  Probably because I am, he thinks.

  ___

  Later that night at the shelter Frederic is especially grateful for the warmth of the heaters as he weaves past the other evacuees. There are more displaced families in the church hall than on the previous nights. It’s packed.

  Frederic scans the room for Claire. She’s nowhere to be seen. He wonders miserably where she could be. Where she will be sleeping tonight. In an abandoned train carriage or a junkyard shed? Or huddled in blankets and newspapers under an archway or bridge somewhere?

  Frederic sighs and looks for Thierry.

  But when Frederic reaches the spot where Thierry and his mother have been camped, he sees another woman and her children have taken their place.

  ‘Where’s Thierry and his maman?’ Frederic asks the woman nursing her baby.

  ‘The people here before us?’ she asks.

  Frederic nods.

  ‘They left. The flooding on their street has subsided. They’ve gone home.’

  Frederic thanks her. He doesn’t even know where Thierry lives. And just like that, his only friends are gone.

  Frederic feels filled with grief and loneliness. He hasn’t felt this lost since the night his father died.

  He puts his hand in the pocket of his jacket and feels the cold hard diamond there.

  This time tomorrow night he’ll face his father’s killer and now he has nothing to lose.

  The time has arrived. It’s time to confront Manteau.

  Frederic pushes the diamond into a sock and hides it in his luggage. Whatever happens, Manteau won’t walk away with the prize.

  He quietly tiptoes away from his sleeping mother and steps out of the hall into the dark, freezing city.

  Frederic runs as fast as he can into the night. He runs to keep warm, but also to stop himself from reconsidering and returning to the shelter. For the first time in a long time there are hardly any clouds in the sky, and the flooded streets shimmer in the light of the full moon and from the electric street lamps that have been reinstalled with gas lighting.

  He jumps from passerelles to passerelles, street to street. He darts over the bridge of Louis-Philippe, then across the smaller and narrower Pont Saint-Louis and ends up directly behind Notre Dame.

  Frederic stops and catches his breath and takes in the silhouette of the cathedral looming over him. Making a sharp left he stands at the entrance, then races towards the giant bronze figure of King Charlemagne perched on his horse.

  It’s so eerily silent that Frederic can hear the rushing current of the river and his own heart beating rapidly against his chest. But then he hears a slight scraping behind him. He whips his head back towards the cathedral.

  No one. Not a soul in sight.

  He tells himself he mustn’t let his nerves get the better of him. But when he turns to face King Charlemagne he is startled to see a figure emerge from behind the statue.

  It’s the man called Manteau.

  For a moment, Frederic stops breathing and his legs feel wobbly and weak. He exhales.

  ‘A boy?’ Manteau hisses, before breaking into a coughing chuckle. ‘What game is this? Who has put you up to this?’

  ‘This isn’t a game!’ Frederic stutters, feeling his courage return. ‘I’m here to make you pay for what you did to my father.’

  With only a few metres between them, Manteau takes another step closer to Frederic. He looks confused.

  With a rush of anger Frederic realises that he doesn’t recognise him.

  ‘You don’t remember me or my father, do you?’

  Manteau laughs again. ‘Can’t say that I do. Should I?’ As the clouds move across the moon, the light reveals more clearly his stone-cold face.

  How could he forget? wonders Frederic. Wouldn’t killing a man remain as clear as day? Is killing people such a normal event for this hateful murderer? He feels desperate for this man to say something, anything about his father, to show the slightest bit of remorse. To admit what he’s done.

  ‘You killed him!’ Frederic says.

  He’s overcome with so much fury that all he wants to do is to charge at Manteau. But he doesn’t.

  ‘The Louvre! Last summer!’ he spits.

  ‘Oh,’ the man says. Then he shrugs his shoulders. ‘And? So what? He got in the way of my business. I guess it was a bit of bad luck for him, eh?’

  ‘A bit of bad luck?’ says Frederic. He feels his fists clench.

  ‘Enough of your foolishness, boy. Give me the diamond,’ Manteau demands. ‘Or you’ll end up in the same place as your papa. Come on, hand it over.’ He steps closer to Frederic and pulls something from his coat. He holds it up and Frederic can see that it’s a dagger.

  ‘Boy, if you’ve come to teach me a lesson, you’re making a mistake. I don’t take lessons. Now . . . I’ll ask you one more time, where is the diamond?’

  ‘I don’t have it!’ Frederic snaps defiantly. ‘You don’t actually think I’d bring it with me, do you?’

  Manteau’s eyes narrow and his top lip curls. He glares at Frederic for a moment, turns and begins to walk away.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Frederic calls. He feel
s himself becoming increasingly agitated. He expected many things, but not this.

  ‘Hey!’ he calls after Manteau. ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘You’ve wasted my time, boy,’ he says, without turning. ‘There are plenty of other jewels to rob, plenty more art that I will get a very good price for.’

  Frederic is taken aback. Is this evil man just going to walk away? As if this was nothing? As if his father’s life meant nothing?

  ‘That’s it?’ Frederic shouts. He can feel the emotion welling up inside him and he can’t hold it in. He chokes on a sob and he can hear the tears in his voice. ‘Are you really going to walk off like some coward?’

  Manteau does not answer Frederic. As he slips away into the night, two other figures emerge from the darkness. It’s the two men who had showed up at the hotel room. Frederic contemplates turning and making a run for it, but he tells himself he must stand his ground this time, for his father. He brushes away the tears, clenches his fists and widens his stance.

  The tall one rushes at him first with a dagger.

  Frederic sidesteps him, and let’s loose with a coup de pied au corp, a forward kick to the body – but his foot is knocked away before making contact.

  Frederic is caught off guard.

  The tall man lunges at him again, and Frederic ducks, grabs the hand holding the dagger and bites hard into it. The man growls and drops his weapon. Frederic follows up with a knee-thrust into his ribs.

  The man grimaces and throws an unexpected left punch into Frederic’s neck.

  Frederic stumbles backward, doubling over and clasping at his throat. He coughs and gasps – and isn’t prepared for the shorter man who follows up with a revers fouetté – a reverse roundhouse kick – into Frederic’s hip.

  Frederic is knocked off his feet and hits the flooded ground hard with a splash. The bitterly cold water startles him, but before he can get back up on his feet, the two men jump on top of him. He gasps at a lungful of air before he feels his face pushed under the water.

  Frederic wriggles and struggles to shove the men off – but they’re too heavy. He sees bubbles of air rapidly leaving his mouth and tries not to breathe in water.

  He’s so dizzy now, he’s about to pass out.

  Just before he does, the two men yank him back out of the water.

  Frederic gasps, coughs and splutters, sucking in as much oxygen as he can. The short one frisks him, rummaging through his pockets.

  ‘He doesn’t have the diamond on him,’ he growls.

  ‘Don’t think this is over, boy,’ snarls the other, before letting loose with a forceful backhanded slap across Frederic’s face.

  Frederic topples backwards, his face once again submerged underwater.

  For a moment Frederic lies motionless, finally realising that no one is holding him down, that the men have gone.

  What a fool to think that confronting my father’s killer would solve anything, he thinks. I'll never get remorse from Manteau. And I'll never be the son my father wanted.

  Frederic drags himself back to the shelter, soaking wet, limping and sore, constantly checking that he isn’t being followed. For the first time he lets himself think about how things could have been different without that terrible night in the museum.

  Would I have told my father what I wanted? he wonders. I never told him about the horses or that I didn’t want to be a fighter. Would I have had the courage to go my own way?

  I hope so. One day.

  Suddenly he realises what he needs to do.

  If I’m to beat Manteau, I’ll have to do it my way, he thinks. And I can’t do it alone.

  He only hopes his friends will forgive him. Frederic runs non-stop all the way back to the shelter with a new plan in mind.

  ___

  The following morning when Frederic wakes, his entire body hurts. The right side of his face throbs and feels twice the size. He touches under his eye and feels how swollen it is. He looks down at his hip and chest – they are deep red with spreading bruises.

  He quickly rolls over to hide his face when he hears his mother stirring. He pretends to be sleeping.

  ‘Be good,’ she whispers into his ear, and kisses him on the top of his head. ‘I’m off to work.’

  Frederic moans as if he is just waking up and waits until she’s made her way out of the shelter. He then hastily shuffles over to the closest heating station where he has left his wet clothes to dry overnight.

  A minute later, he is back in the cold streets and is walking as fast as he can towards the Left Bank of the city to find Claire.

  When he reaches the junkyard, where they found the rowboat, he hopes his hunch is correct. He steps into the old train carriage and is surprised to see an entire family huddled together under blankets.

  ‘What do you want?’ says the father.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ says Frederic. ‘I’m looking for Claire.’

  ‘Who?’ asks the mother, cradling a toddler.

  ‘I know Claire,’ says an older child, about Frederic’s age. ‘I think she sometimes sleeps in the other carriage, at the top of the junkyard. But I haven’t seen her recently.’

  ‘Thanks,’ says Frederic, rushing out.

  When Frederic steps into the other abandoned carriage he sees Claire lying on the floor fast asleep next to another family.

  He coughs loudly.

  They all look up startled.

  Claire springs up. She looks shocked to see him.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ she says, sounding angry.

  ‘Who is he?’ asks the woman beside her.

  ‘Just someone I know. He’s not dangerous. Go back to sleep,’ Claire says, standing up and dragging Frederic outside.

  He notices that she is wearing her usual dress and jacket but has kept her new boots. He wonders if she has sold the new clothes for food.

  ‘I wanted to find you,’ says Frederic. ‘Was that your mother?’

  ‘No,’ says Claire. ‘You think you know everything, but you don’t. I never knew my father and my mother died of pneumonia two years ago. These people have looked after me since then – and better than any orphanage would have.’

  Frederic sighs. ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘I don’t need your pity. I’m fine as I am. At least I’m free.’

  ‘No,’ says Frederic. ‘That’s not what I meant. I’m sorry I said those things. Without those shelters we would all be homeless. And you were right – I was so wrong to think I’d be able to take on my father’s killer on my own. I can’t. So I’m here to ask your help, even though I don’t deserve it. Please, Claire. Will you help me?’

  Claire screws up her face, and doesn’t answer.

  ‘To be honest, you and Thierry were the best things that happened to me too,’ says Frederic.

  Slowly, Claire’s scowl turns into a grin. She nods.

  ‘Of course I’ll help you,’ she says. ‘You always help your friends.’

  She reaches out her hand to shake his.

  ‘I need Thierry’s help too,’ Frederic says, taking her hand. ‘I need the three of us – the Floodwater Friends or Terrific Trio or the Crocodile Crusaders or whatever he wants to call us! But I don’t know where he lives.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter where he lives,’ says Claire. ‘Where else would Thierry be if he’s not at home?’

  Frederic thinks for a moment and recalls Thierry saying the place where he reads most of his books.

  ‘The Sainte Genevieve library!’

  Claire nods.

  ‘We’d better get going,’ Frederic says. ‘Because once we find Thierry we’ve got a lot to do.’

  As he steps into the foyer of the Sainte Genevieve library, Frederic feels as out of place as he did in the lobby of the Hotel Christophe-Antoine. But it’s a very different place – there is nothing soft and plush and warm here. Cold stone columns hold up an impossibly high roof and the large tiled floor is bare of rugs. It’s more like a government building than a place to find books. Dire
ctly in front of them, a huge stone stairway leads upwards.

  He notices Claire straightening up and brushing down her dress – even she looks intimidated.

  ‘He must be in the reading room and those stairs are the only way in,’ Frederic says to her. ‘Let’s go.’

  The two walk towards the stairs and two men coming down glare with disapproval.

  At the top of the stairs is a massive door. Behind it, Frederic feels sure, are all the books Thierry has spoken about . . . and Thierry.

  But a man steps between them and the door. He’s pencil-thin and scowling, with his lips pursed tightly. He’s wearing a guard’s uniform.

  ‘No children are allowed!’ he says. ‘Shoo!’

  ‘But that can’t be right,’ Claire says. ‘Our friend says he reads here. And he’s only twelve.’

  The man shakes his head. ‘No one under the age of eighteen is allowed in the library – and even then they have to be registered. Come back in about six years. In the meantime, I insist you leave!’

  ‘But how does Thierry get in?’ Claire asks Frederic.

  The guard rolls his eyes. ‘Oh, Thierry Bonneville,’ he sneers. ‘Well, if I had it my way he wouldn’t. But he has a job – the tedious chore of dusting the spines of the books. Instead of being paid, he is allowed to read. But he is the exception. No other enfants are allowed.’

  ‘Well, if we’re not allowed in, could you please let him know we’re here to see him?’ Frederic asks as politely as possible.

  ‘Who do you think I am? No. I will not retrieve your friend as if I’m some hunting dog. Now . . . leave!’

  Claire pulls at Frederic’s sleeve and turns to head back down the stairs.

  ‘I’m going to distract the guard,’ she whispers to Frederic. ‘And you run in . . . d’accord? Just let me know when he turns his back to us.’

  Frederic glances over his shoulder to see the guard turning away. Just as the man opens the door to step into the reading room, Frederic hears a scream.

  He whips his head around to see Claire sprawled out on the ground at the bottom of the stairs. For a moment even he’s worried – it looks frighteningly believable. She’s a good actress, he thinks.