The Mosque of Notre Dame

by Elena Chudinova

  The attack on the Île de la Cité began before dawn. Since six the evening before, armed units had slowly gathered in the underground around the metro station. In the station itself, the evening crowd of Muslim passengers had gone into the metro as usual, hurried to grab seats in the cars, and sat rustling their evening newspapers and their bags of chips—never guessing that gathering around them quietly was the soul of a humiliated people.

  There were almost no passengers getting off at Cité . Most people got on the metro there to get to Cluny, Concorde, Maubert-Mutualité , and so on, the residential neighborhoods. By about 8 p.m., the river of people passing through the underground started to dry up, dividing into rivulets, and finally into individuals running late and no longer in a hurry to make it home in time for dinner. At about ten, the blacks in orange overalls were bringing out the platform cleaning machines as the last passengers were getting onto their trains.

  Automobiles, mostly expensive ones, took their sleepy owners over the New Bridge, the Little Bridge, the Iron Bridge—which was once called St. Louis Bridge. Those who lived in Champs d’Élysées and in Versailles also hurried home.

  At about midnight, as the serene May night enfolded the city, the Cité station closed. The island was empty— from the park in bloom on the east side—where they say there was once a memorial to the French killed by the Fascists—to the Palace of Justice on the west side. There were still windows with lights on here and there in the Palace of Justice, in the Conciergerie, and in the long, concrete building that housed the French division of Europol. That had been built on the spot where the stained-glass miracle of Sainte-Chapelle once stood—before being leveled by the Wahhabis.

  The scattered yellow flashes from those few windows made the dark silhouettes of the buildings look even darker. In Notre Dame’s former vestry, which now served as the imam’ s apartment, there was also a light.

  A black named Mustafa (in his language, the name sounded different) was lazily pulling plastic bags from trash cans and throwing them into a wheeled bin, which he was pulling behind him. There was a satisfied smile on his wide lips. Every few minutes, he touched the upper pocket of his overalls. In that pocket there was an old pen. Today he had angered his boss by trying to sign a receipt slip with an unsharpened lead pencil.

  “What kind of people are you!” fumed his boss. “Here’s a pen, you fool; keep it!” This was a crowning achievement. Mustafa had been waiting for this pen for four months, not a day less. The respected Sharif-ali was so stingy, he wouldn’t give anyone so much as a box of matches.

  This evening Mustafa planned to go to Marais to a well-known fortune-teller. He would give her the present he had received from his boss. After that, the boss would have no choice—he would have to increase Mustafa’s salary to thirty euros, no less, and even give his daughter in marriage. Let him just try to cross Baron Subotka—who, they say, was created by the woman whose name was better left unsaid. Baron Subotka was easy to pick out in a crowd. He wore a black suit with a narrow black tie and black eyeglasses. He smoked and he liked to joke around. He ate for three men—in the blink of an eye, he could wolf down ten pita breads with mutton and the same number of portions of couscous . Whatever fool did not honor Fridays, Baron Subotka would laugh on the day of that man’s death. The fruit tree in the backyard is not growing there by chance, and the empty clay pots on the shelves in the room are not there for decoration!

  They said that in old times, when the Catholics came, it was even worse. Their priests in the colonies punished and destroyed for such things... But where were they now? The black people were more intelligent than everyone else, and in the end they would outlive everyone else.

  If Mustafa didn’t honor Baron Subotka, he would have been afraid to work in the metro. There were all sorts of stories about abandoned stations. It was said that they intersected with underground graves with white bones, unsuitable for fortune telling. These bones were guarded by white spirits who served the dead who once ruled the city. The white spirits appeared in the old branches on the metro, wandering through them as they liked. Baron Subotka had always protected Mustafa, and would protect him from all the white spirits.

  Dropping a bag into the container, Mustafa straightened up. What was that noise coming from the tunnel? Aaaaaaah!

  The white spirit had long, silver, wavy hair that fell down its back and it held an automatic rifle in its hands. What was a spirit doing with a rifle? Something was not right! Spirits could not stomp their feet—but he could hear a muffled clattering coming from the tunnel. Another spirit, also with an automatic rifle, and another, and another...

  Mustafa threw down his bag and fell on the concrete, painfully scraping his hands and making them bleed. He jumped up and ran toward the staircase, screaming at the top of his voice...

  If he hadn’t started making so much noise, they would have allowed him, a cleaner who was not to blame for anything, to walk away. But they couldn’t allow a living siren to run out into the street like that at the beginning of an operation. A single shot was heard.

  Mustafa didn’t even have time to get angry with Baron Subotka.

  Eugène-Olivier put his pistol back in its holster.

  Upon exiting the metro, the units of the advance guard separated into two groups. One made for the Palace of Justice and the Conciergerie as the other half ran in formation to cut off the bridges.

  The unit of defensive guards led by Brisseville was also divided. Heavy weapons had to be brought to the Cité platform—the weapons whose existence had to be kept secret. They needed to create an underground line of defense in tunnels at three stations: Châtelet, Saint Michel and Pont-Neuf.

  They had at most four hours at their disposal to do this. Brisseville bit open his adrenalin vial to help his breathing. In World War II, their great-grandfathers had injected adrenalin.

  Several spacious rooms on the second floor of the Palace of Justice, on the front side, were brightly lit, although there was no one in the reception area. Sheik Said al Masriv, walking alone through the offices, had already knocked over a stool and a pot with a miniature tree. There was no one to pick them up, and he was reluctant to call his driver from downstairs. Consequently bits of ceramic kept finding their way under his feet and he had already managed to scratch himself with them. The spilled earth was smeared all over his shoes and on the plush carpet.

  Usually he walked thoughtfully—slowly, as if he were sleepy—in accordance with his corpulent body. Excitement made him clumsy.

  There were a dozen papers scattered on his desk. The computer monitor flickered. The Sheik had not prepared a document by himself for many years, but the report he had to compose now could not be entrusted to even his most trusted aide.

  An invasion: an incredible, impossible intervention. The agent from Moscow had advised that the network of saboteurs who had been so carefully prepared had been discovered, invalidated, and pulled up by the roots. After advising this, he stopped reporting. Twenty-four hours had passed since then. Sheik Said neglected sleep, food and prayer trying to verify this claim once more. Was it possible that it was true? It bore a strong resemblance to the truth.

  A resignation, in the best case: that would be something better for him to submit himself. But how was it possible? It was incomprehensible. Was there anything in the drawer for blood pressure? Or at least for tachycardia? He couldn’t call a physician. Why give them material for rumors in advance. But if only he could find a little tablet... There was something here—no, it was for digestion, for gastritis.

  It was always like that, whenever he didn’t need something, it would always appear from somewhere!

  The door opened silently. The Sheik simply felt a draft of air—the well-greased hinges did not make a sound.

  He certainly didn’t expect the person who entered, but he wasn’t surprised. The director of the atomic laboratory was hardly a stranger.

  “You’ve come to pay me a visit, effendi ? Who informed you?”


  “What difference does it make?” answered Ahmad ibn Salih loftily.

  That was true. So he knew everything. Sheik Said, suddenly feeling tired, lay down on a sofa.

  “I think that it would be better for you to think about who informed Moscow,” Ahmad ibn Salih stood at the door, not hurrying to close it. In fact, he was holding it open.

  “What?” Sheik Said choked and began coughing. “It’s already known who leaked the information?”

  “Such comprehensive and thorough leaks of information don’t just happen.” Ahmad ibn Salih’s lips curved into a spiteful smile. “It could only have been a direct and intentional betrayal. Differently put, it could only be the work of a spy who managed to deeply penetrate the system. Very deeply. So deeply that you know him personally.”

  “Who is it?” The Sheik ’s heart was beating in his temples. His career was finished, in any case, but at least he would have some consolation if the son of the devil was punished. Oh, he would bite through his windpipe with his own teeth—if he could. “He’s still alive? He hasn’t managed to kill himself? Effendi , in the name of Allah, tell me he’s still alive!”

  “Alive as alive can be and feeling quite well, actually.”

  “You’ve consoled me as much as possible in this situation, may Allah bless you for it. But please tell me, who is he?”

  “Me.”

  Slobodan suddenly felt as light as a feather. He felt that he could do anything—to swim at the bottom of the ocean without worrying about breathing, to marvel at the algae and coral, to fly like a bird above the city, to pass through cliffs.

  For so many years he had forbidden himself to even fantasize about the moment he would cast the truth into their faces. Ahmad ibn Salih still held the door. Sheik Said felt as if he were delirious, as if he were losing his mind. Consequently, the news did not surprise him.

  But then an older woman dressed like a kafir walked into the office after the scientist. This was impossible, it simply didn’t happen that a kafir woman in black jeans with hair that was not only uncovered, but fell loose down her back should suddenly walk into the office of a senior state official.

  “You didn’t hear well, you son of a bitch,” she said nonchalantly and cheerfully. “Not only is he a Russian spy, he’s also a Serb. And now guess who I am. Here’s a clue: What lullaby do they sing to put your grandchildren to sleep?”

  Trying to wake up, the Sheik moved toward the alarm button. The delirium continued—no one tried to stop him. Or maybe—the thought crossed his mind—the security alarm was not working any more?

  No, everything was fine, everything was fine with the alarm. The red button blinked, indicating the signal had been sent.

  He stood there, repeatedly pushing the button as the two of them watched him.

  “There’s no one there to answer to your signal,” explained the woman. “The security guards are already cuddling with black-eyed houris .”

  “Sevazmios!”

  “Finally. I asked our friend from Russia to show me who came up with the plan for poisoning our water supplies. I’m looking at you and I just can’t believe how it’s possible for such trash to provoke such enormous, irreparable misfortunes. When a mountain gives birth to a mouse, that’s logically comprehensible. But when the opposite occurs, my mind just can’t grasp it. I’m afraid that all the misfortunes of humanity in the last hundred and fifty years have occurred because mice like you kept coming up with mountains. Luckily, before me I have a mouse who didn’t manage to give birth to his mountain.”

  “How ...how did you manage to get in here, kafirs ? Where is security? Where are the police?” The Sheik ’s desperate desire to understand something, anything, suppressed even his fear.

  “It’s just that the ninth crusade has begun outside,” said Sophia, flashing a smile, motioning to Slobodan with her hand. “We’ve prepared for it a long time, but now there will be no more Euroislam and soon there will be no more Islam, period. All right, Slobo, finish him off. As you can see, it’s not as grand a feeling as you might expect.”

  Sheik Said, whose eyes saw nothing—as if they were made of glass—didn’t even try to save himself. Perhaps he wasn’t even aware he was in danger. He just quietly and rhythmically rocked back and forth.

  Slobodan took out his pistol.

  The strangest thing was that between them, there was none of the intimacy that hatred engenders. To the sheik, it seemed as if they could walk through each other—each moving in the space of his own dream. But Slobodan’s dream was shiny and light. The dream of Sheik Said was a nightmare that caused him to break out in cold sweat.

  When the Sheik ’s body fell with the back of his head on the floor—between the overturned stool and the broken pieces of pottery—Slobodan looked with a strange disappointment at the disfigured face with a hole above the left brow. It did not resemble his fantasy of so many years. He felt a slight revulsion—as though he had touched a cockroach with his bare hand—and an icy coldness in his heart.

  “Sonya, don’t you think you exaggerated?” Slobodan now spoke Russian without an accent, his fluency finally returning after so many years. “Perhaps you played up the colors just a bit?”

  “Haven’t you ever played poker? A little bit of bluffing sometimes helps to put the dot on the ‘i’. The Palace of Justice is ours, but there is still shooting at the Conciergerie. Do you hear it?”

  The noise of gunfire in the dark seemed far away—no louder than crickets on a summer night. Modern, double-glazed windows are very good at neutralizing sound.

  CHAPTER 15

  The barricades (continued)

  “It will be terribly damaging if they begin attacking from planes.” The May morning was fresh. Jeanne raised the collar of her light jacket. Her cheeks and the tip of her nose were ruddy, and her grayish-blue eyes were very sleepy. She persisted, “What if they attack Notre Dame?”

  “They won’t,” said Eugène-Olivier. “There are so many of their buildings here in the Cité that if they bomb, they’re bound to hit at least one of them. There’s the Palace of Justice and the Conciergerie... They won’t even use artillery until they find out we have it. For a handful of rebels, it’s not worth losing the buildings. But they’ll get us out in twenty-four hours. If they knew the most important thing, nothing would stop them from using their bombs. But they have no way of finding out before it’s too late.”

  “It’s good that Notre Dame will become Notre Dame once again,” said Jeanne radiantly. “I think that if a church were a man, it would want to die on a day like today. If I were in its place, it’s what I would want.”

  They were walking in front of the Palace of Justice in broad daylight, in the mid-early morning—walking nonchalantly with Kalashnikovs in their hands through the very center of French Islam, with the wind tousling Jeanne’s fine hair.

  Just for this moment I’d be willing to die a dozen deaths, thought Eugène-Olivier. Was it worth feeling sorry for the church? She was right. At this moment, its stones couldn’t be completely lifeless.

  There was a pile of crates with Stingers next to the Europol building. Among the Maquisards milling around, Eugène-Olivier finally saw a few familiar faces. Maurice Lauder had lost his mother last year when the imam called on them to accept the true faith. That was when he joined Maquis . He survived that day by a miracle; he was in the hospital having his appendix out. His younger brother disappeared—Eugène-Olivier didn’t know the details. Everyone here had his losses, and it was impolite to ask. He waved, but Maurice didn’t notice—he was getting orders from his commanding officer.

  “It’s beautiful, like summer at the seaside,” said Jeanne quietly. “What do you think? Are we going to sunbathe in peace like this for a while?”

  Eugène-Olivier did not answer her right away. Finally, he said, “At least a couple of hours. They’re not doing anything right now. They’re in shock. I believe they’ve simply blocked off the approaches to the bridges and are sitting in meetings. At all levels.
”

  “Mass has to start before noon, and it’s 8:30 now. Perhaps many of us will not be killed after all. Perhaps we’ll be able to stop and enjoy the Mass. Oh, if only the Saracens didn’t begin their attack until 1:00!”

  How easy it was, simply to walk beside her and talk to her. And how silly it was to try to invent topics for conversation, when all one had to do was look around. He could have gone on like this for a hundred years. But Georges Pernoud, who outranked him, was walking toward them.

  “And what are you doing, Lévêque?”

  “Larochejaquelein ordered me to patrol the second line on the barricades.”

  “We’re taking half our people off the barricades, haven’t you heard? The surviving Muslims have lodged in the church itself, in the imam’ s apartment. They’re shooting at the entrances.”

  “Pigs!”

  “No kidding. Go report to Roger Bertaud. They’re to the right of the main entrance. And you, Saintville, stay on the barricades. Here, take this cell phone; you know how to use it?” He tossed it.

  Jeanne caught it. “It’s nice,” she said. “You took it from a Muslim?”

  “Yes. Apparently it doesn’t have a pink code. But just in case, don’t turn it off. If they start to close in, call Larochejaquelein. I’ve put his number in for you.”

  “Great.” Jeanne threw her new toy up in the air and caught it as she ran, hurrying toward the New Bridge.

  “Listen, you! Remember, no showing off!” Pernoud shouted after her. “There’s always trouble with that one.”

  Eugène-Olivier nodded grimly, thinking that with trouble like Jeanne, one didn’t really need happiness.

  * * *

  “Do something! Why can’t those barricades be removed? Who approved them, anyway? Launch an air attack, bring in the navy, do something—the kafirs are attacking!”