The Mosque of Notre Dame

by Elena Chudinova

  Larochejaquelein’s gaze swept the dozens of faces turned toward him, and he announced, “The Seine will run red with blood, and it will rise. If anyone here doesn’t consider himself crazy enough to take part, he should leave Paris immediately. No one has the right to condemn him.”

  No one got up to leave. Father Lothaire, who had stepped away from the podium, was speaking quietly with a dozen men who approached him.

  “The others will receive orders from their unit commanders,” Larochejaquelein said. “Commanders, please stay for consultations.”

  “Just one more question,” cried Father Lothaire from above in the crowd. “Our volunteers still have not been assigned to units.”

  “But you’re from the catacombs, you don’t take up weapons,” said Philippe André Brisseville, confused.

  “For a Mass in Notre Dame Cathedral, we will take up weapons,” answered Father Lothaire.

  CHAPTER 15

  The barricades

  He barely managed to park: First, the wheels went up onto the sidewalk. In his second attempt, he scratched the door of a laundry truck. That wasn’t good. The driver would remember that a fancy Ferrari had scratched him.

  Kasim glanced around stealthily: There was no one in the truck or nearby. For good measure, he staggered as if drugged. (For members of the true faith, you couldn’t say that they staggered as if drunk .) Kasim closed the door, forgetting his purse, CD player, and expensive umbrella on the seat.

  Sliding into a courtyard passage covered with drying linens, Kasim, bending down to avoid the wet laundry, crossed into the next street. He needed to choose a place from which his car wouldn’t be seen.

  And he really should have removed the things from the seat. He didn’t care if they were stolen but if they were, he would have to report it, and if he reported it, he would be asked an inconvenient question—where he had been? He really had no reason to be here in Marais. They would connect the awkward facts.

  Oh, to hell with it. Why was he afraid of his own shadow?

  Kasim decisively looked around. A small shop like many in similarly poor neighborhoods caught his attention. It was a general-store-pharmacy-bakery with small items for the household. Everything necessary.

  As you might expect, the only person in the store was the owner, a fat woman in a black chador who was counting packages of school markers on the counter.

  “Forgive me, hanuma ,” he said in Turkish. In neighborhoods such as these, they did not even know lingua franca, and they prayed only in Arabic. “My cell phone is out of order. May use your telephone?” In order to be more convincing, he pulled out his cell phone, which he had turned off, and showed it with a frown.

  The owner bustled about, excited by the chance to do a favor for the handsome senior officer—and yet a little miffed that he had not come in to buy something. Soon, she came out of the inner rooms with a telephone.

  He dialed, and waited a long time. Eight rings. That did not bother Kasim, because he remembered that at the other end, there was a similar shop also filled with a mixture of smells too thick for such a small space. Cloves, cinnamon, thyme, and the rubbery smell of cheap detergent, the horrible smell of an accidentally broken vial of smelling salts, and coffee grounds fought for dominance with eau de toilette and plain old dust.

  “Hello.” An old voice could be heard, unexpectedly loudly.

  He could speak French in peace and no one would notice. No one would dare to ask which language an officer of the Interior Army ought to speak. Telephones in the ghetto were not tapped. No official was curious about the thoughts of cattle about to be slaughtered. But the telephones of state officials were a completely different story.

  “Forgive me, Monsieur. I’m a friend of your upstairs neighbor, Monsieur Antoine Thibault. Would you be so kind as to call him?”

  “Just a moment.” He could hear the unsure steps thudding up the squeaky stairs.

  The wait was long, very long. Surely it would be enough for him to enter the next room to find himself in the house next door. A voice came on.

  “This is Thibault.”

  Kasim could not speak right away.

  “...Allo?”

  “Antoine...” Kasim’s mouth had become dry. “This is a relative on your mother’s side.”

  He did not dare say who he was. But it should be unnecessary. Antoine would understand, even if he didn’t recognize the voice. Perhaps he would not recognize it. When was the last time they had talked? Iman had been a year old.

  There was no response for a long time.

  “A little unexpected, no?” There was a somber irony in his cousin’s voice.

  “Antoine, I can’t talk for long...” stammered Kasim. “Please tell me whether you have a card to leave the city.”

  “I didn’t get one this year. Why?”

  “You should go visit your family in Compiègne. If you don’t have money, I’ll send you some.”

  Yes, I can do that. No one traces the transfer of small amounts of money. And a trip to Compiègne for four, for which a family from the ghetto had to scrimp and save for half a year, was a very small sum. How was it even possible to live as they did—in two connected rooms above a shop, without their own telephone, with a small shower in the corner of the kitchen? Linoleum worn out from thousands of steps, tiles falling off, unmatched furniture from the twentieth century...

  “Tell me, dear cousin, why this sudden and touching concern for my summer vacation?”

  “Toto, don’t be sarcastic!” Kasim wiped the sweat from his forehead. Was the shop owner looking at him too closely? There was no way to tell, through those rags she wore... No, she was not. She waddled off again into the residential part, from which he could smell couscous. “Believe me, I’m not talking off the top of my head. Do you hear me? I don’t have a lot of time!”

  “I understand. I don’t need money. I have a little saved. I wanted to buy an old Ford. So you’re telling me I should not buy the car and I should go to Compiègne instead?”

  “You have to go. You have to. As soon as you can prepare your documents.”

  “Or I may find myself in an awkward situation?”

  And not only you, thought Kasim with a kind of mute sorrow. But he didn’t dare say that. If the inhabitants of the ghetto all headed out of Paris, an investigation would be launched to find out where they got their information. They would search, and they would undoubtedly find.

  “Yes, you may find yourself in an awkward situation.”

  “All right then, in three weeks we’ll be in Compiègne.”

  “Not in three weeks. As soon as you can prepare your documents.”

  “Very well,” Antoine said with a frown in his voice. “But our officials have all gone mad here. Imagine, today they announced new rules: For every lousy document, you have to wait almost a month! Even worse, the old cards aren’t valid from today. Everything has to be done over! But if necessary, I can give them a few francs and they’ll do it faster. Should I do that?”

  “Mmm, no. There’s no reason to.”

  “Alright then. And how long should we stay there?”

  “As long as possible. I can’t tell you more—forgive me.”

  “All right, Babar,” Antoine’s voice became warmer. “And how is your family?”

  “Thank you, my wife and daughters are well. That’s all. I can’t talk more.” Kasim cut off the connection and threw the receiver onto the wood counter as if it had burned his hand.

  He left the store, forgetting that he had intended to buy something to thank his hostess. So much risk. All for nothing.

  He had feared his own shadow for nothing. He had come up with some precautions for nothing. He waged a battle with himself for nothing, reminding himself that he was a sixth-generation soldier... for nothing.

  They were already at work, those devilish green helmets. The plan to liquidate the ghetto had barely been drawn up. Not twenty-four hours had passed since he had learned of it, and those Abdulwahids had already
pulled the necessary levers.

  The devil take them, the devil take them all! What would change if he only managed to save Antoine and his wife and children? Nothing—although for Kasim, it was very important. How much better he would feel if he at least managed to save Antoine... Not even because of their shared childhood—although that was a reason, too—but because Antoine was the only man he could warn...

  As a practical matter, the policy was absolutely correct. The ghetto was essential to the existence of Maquis . If the word Maquis had once meant a scrub tree, then the roots of that scrub were in the ghetto. As a soldier, he couldn’t disobey, and of course, he would carry out his orders.

  But how many young people were there in the ghetto who were still infected with the silly prejudices of their parents? Those prejudices were no longer as strong. Their children in turn could become a normal part of society. The more generations that passed, the further from fanaticism they would become. Many were not ready today, but tomorrow they would grow tired of rotting and barely eking out a living.

  But there would be no tomorrow. Whoever did not convert in the coming days would be sentenced to death. Antoine, why did you allow this to happen? You have sons! How many people will die because prejudices still run strong, and the higher-ups will no longer wait for them to become slowly diluted?

  The Maquisards , the Maquisards were to blame for everything! If it were not for them and their murders of eminent Paris figures, the ghetto would have gotten smaller with each passing year, and no one would have to destroy it!

  When had he gotten behind the wheel? He had been driving for some time, but he didn’t even remember getting into the car.

  He was going somewhere, staring at his windshield as if it were the screen of a forbidden television. There was a film on the screen. Two boys were running home through a green meadow—tired of playing, hungry. Here they were in the dining room. The rays of the sun streaming through the high windows were reflected from the polished hardwood floor. The balcony doors were open. Near every opening, there was a narrow crystal vase with a rose, the crystal refracting the sun... And Aunt Odile in a white summer dress, looking so much like his mother.

  “Dear, I warned you!” Uncle Dominique made a dissatisfied face, making a gesture to hold back the plate that had almost touched the tablecloth in front of the boy. On the white porcelain with a blue border, among the pieces of roasted potato sprinkled with parsley, was a golden pork chop with semi-translucent edges.

  “Oh, I forgot!” a shadow fell across his aunt’s face. “Forgive me, my dear,” she said to her nephew. “I’ll bring you something else.”

  The aunt quickly removed the plate from under his nose. Why did he have to eat veal cutlets when everyone else was eating pork chops? He sat, insulted, and watched Toto eating. At the same moment, a cutlet appeared and he started chewing automatically and absent-mindedly.

  “You know that Léon gave us specific instructions with the child. You need to be more careful.”

  “Yes, I know. But is it really something that important?” Aunt Odile looked at the children, who were busy eating. Actually, his cousin was too hungry to pay attention to what the adults were saying for about ten minutes, but he... The prepared veal cutlet was pulled from a cardboard box of the type that are stocked in one’s freezer and then rapidly heated in a microwave oven. It wasn’t very tasty. He foggily remembered that the conversation of his aunt and uncle had something to do with him, if he could only recall what they said.

  “All too important,” said his uncle quietly. “Our Léon has always been a talented careerist. I can’t say that he’s not capable.”

  “But it’s such nonsense...”

  “You’re wrong. It is very serious, Odile—as serious as the fact that this will be our last summer in this house. What can I say? Unlike me, Léon doesn’t want to pay a penalty now for a “family reunification” law from 1976 that flooded the country with Muslims. I do understand. It’s humiliating for grandchildren to be charged for the debts of their grandfathers.”

  “I think it’s better to lose our summer house than to take part in such a farce.”

  “I’m afraid our losses will not stop there, Odile. This time, I’m no less far-sighted than Léon. When you start to withdraw, you can’t stop.”

  Kasim suddenly braked, barely stopping in time for the light. So that’s where that sentence came from! How powerful childhood memories could be!

  So where did your far-sightedness take you, Uncle Dominique? Your grandchildren live in misery, denied everything that Antoine and I had as children! They have no summer house, no Internet, no polo, no cricket, no tennis!

  But my children, let alone my grandchildren, also have no polo, no tennis, and there is no money on earth that can buy them the right to play computer games.

  When you start to withdraw, you can’t stop.

  At least the grandchildren of my father will not die this week.

  They won’t die. But the great-grandchildren of my father will not be his great-grandchildren. They will not even be my grandchildren. They will be foreigners.

  So no one won. It was all pointless. No cocaine could help. He was a soldier, and he had to carry out his orders.

  Kasim understood that he was driving on the Champs d’Élysées, right by the spot where qadi Malik was killed. The passage where the explosion occurred was closed. The sidewalk in front of it was sealed off with a net. Turkish workers were lazily collecting the remnants of broken tiles. All they needed to do was put in new glass and tiles, but they hadn’t even begun.

  He had to phone Aset, as he had promised he would. She was nervous, as before. Last night, it was as if she felt they were calling him with orders to carry out some reprehensible act. She did not ask anything, but she had that tense, strange look of the guilty...

  Kasim swore through his teeth. His cell phone, which he had turned off to seem more convincing, had been off for more than half an hour. He had to control himself. Absent-mindedness was a very bad personal quality.

  The phone rang the moment he turned it on. It was from work. Why were they calling him so frequently all of a sudden? They couldn’t let him finish his lunch in peace. He was on his way to work, after all, even though he hadn’t been called. It was recorded message:

  “All officers are ordered to immediately assume positions! Disregard usual deployments. Battle readiness! Urgent!”

  It must not apply to him. They had sent a text like that through the general network. What else could it possibly be?

  Disconnecting, Kasim dialed the number of his colleague Ali Habib.

  “What are these corrections of Plan 11-22? My battery wasn’t working and I just heard. I’m turning off Champs d’Élysées right now.”

  “Apparently Plan 11-22 isn’t in effect anymore!”

  He was relieved, whatever had happened, the liquidation of the ghettos had been deferred. He couldn’t believe it!

  “So what’s going on?”

  “Some kind of nonsense. A military operation in the city.”

  “Talk about nonsense. Don’t tell me the Russians have attacked Paris?”

  Kasim was already speeding down Rivoli Street. Now it would be better to turn onto the New Bridge, he thought. He slowed down, because there was a crowd of people walking in the street instead of on the sidewalk.

  A dark-skinned policeman shouted at him: “The road is closed! The road is closed! Go back!”

  Kasim extended his plastic card to him without a word.

  “You still can’t pass over the New Bridge, sir!” the policeman said, saluting.

  “What’s going on?” barked Kasim.

  “Mon capitaine can see for himself, sir!”

  Kasim had never seen an accident like it in his life. A big bus of the type that drove students to classes in madrasahs outside the city lay sprawled on the bridge, not even on its side, but with its wheels straight up in the air. There was an empty truck on the left side. How had they managed to col
lide like that, and completely block off the bridge? It was impossible.

  “Cunning swine, they’re not there, they’re not in the vehicles,” fumed the black man.

  “And who are they?”

  “You haven’t heard, sir? It’s the Maquisards .”

  * * *

  “This is called a peribolos .” Larochejaquelein leaned on a bag of cement, pulled out a crumpled pack of Gauloises and began looking for at least one cigarette. “It’s super to line up everything with a gas tank like that. If they start to advance through this mess of cars, you know what’s going to happen. And we’re as safe here as if we were under Christ’s wing. If we unintentionally puncture a gas tank, it’s not important—we’ll get a wall of fire. The most important thing is the empty space between the two barricades. They’re bringing in engineering units now to move the bus...”

  Jeanne laughed. Honestly, she was impatient to see what would happen when the Saracens finally tried.

  “Larochejaquelein,” asked Eugène-Olivier, “wouldn’t it have been easier to just destroy the bridges?” The question had been on the tip of his tongue for several hours, and he finally had the chance to ask it.

  “Think about it, Lévêque.” Larochejaquelein contentedly pulled a cigarette from the pack—it was a little wrinkled, but not broken. “By leaving the bridges in place, we’re the ones who define where they’re going to go. As long as the bridges are intact, they won’t attack us from the water. But if we force them, they’ll be the ones to decide how to attack us. That’s one reason. There’s also another one.”

  “They don’t need to know how what explosives we have!”

  “Yes. The less serious things look to them now, the longer we’ll be able to hold out.”

  Eugène-Olivier nodded. The bag of cement he was leaning on seemed incredibly soft. His eyes were closing. The lull before the new phase of the battle was playing with him. He hadn’t slept all last night.