The Adventures of Mademoiselle Mac 2-Book Bundle (2 page)

I woke to coloured light dancing across my bed. The windows came to life in the morning sun, pale as it was. When I pulled the shutters open, I felt dizzy for a moment. The city of Paris spilled out in front of my eyes — ancient buildings with balconies jammed full of geraniums and a thousand miniature chimneys that sat like broken teeth on a comb. Everywhere were people stopping to talk, gesturing dramatically, buying breakfast, eating as they walked, stepping around pigeons, rushing along dragging children behind them, reading on bicycles, carrying little dogs in baskets and purses or inside their coats. There were the famous monuments I had seen in my school books — the golden dome of Les Invalides, the Eiffel Tower, Sacre Coeur, and the River Seine winding like a ribbon across it all.

I bounced down the staircase to find that Rudee had left me some crusty bread, tiny oranges, savagely stinky cheese, and a map of the city. A note on the torn corner of a newspaper said
Gone to work — have some times
. I descended the stairs from his room and passed through the garden and into the street.

Everything was different. The noises, the voices, the shops, and the people of Paris — the wrinkled roadmap face of the chestnut vendor, leaning over his fire, pushing a few blackened chestnuts around — no,
merci
. He looked as old as time. And the children — the babies were like the dolls in the toy stores I saw everywhere, the ones having tea in the window. Penelope must be in heaven.

Thinking of Penelope reminded me that I'd better make my way to the Latin Quarter to meet my class. I followed the right bank and crossed the river on the Pont Des Arts, a beautiful pedestrian bridge that was decorated with an exhibit of wacky collage photographs. I arrived, a little out of breath, to see the tour group assembled on the sidewalk in front of our residence.

Penelope spotted me and whispered immediately, “Nice timing, Mac. While we've been waiting for you to emerge from your
chambre
, which I don't believe you've actually seen, Mademoiselle Lesage's sympathy for your newfound allergy to almond paste has been wearing thin.”

Our tour guide rushed over to me and put her hand on my forehead. “
Mon Dieu,
child, but you are so warm.” Over her shoulder, I saw Penelope fanning herself dramatically.

“I do feel a little faint, Mademoiselle Lesage,” I said feebly.

“
Oui
, I can see that. Penelope told me you had a reaction to the almond croissant at breakfast.”

“Yes, I had no idea it had ... almonds in it.”

She looked at me pityingly. “Well, Mac, I'm going to have to insist that you remain in your room. We have so much walking to do today.”

I tried not to laugh at Penelope's giant “ahhh” expression. “I suppose you know best.” As Mademoiselle Lesage herded the girls toward Boulevard St. Michel, I made my way into the lobby. While giving them a head start, I glanced at the daily paper,
Le Devoir
, which announced a big “Lighten Up” celebration at the Arc de Triomphe. I
did
have some monuments to see.

I hustled alongside the river past the Musée D'Orsay. Check. Crossing the river on the Pont de la Concorde, I whizzed by the Grand Palais and the Petit Palais. Check. Check. Wow, Monuments R Us here.

I soon found myself on the widest street I'd ever seen. The Champs Élysées was abuzz with what looked like bumper cars, and the broad sidewalks were filled with people speaking every language imaginable. As I approached the Arc de Triomphe, I saw a crowd and heard music. I slipped through the bodies for a closer look. There was a band playing on a temporary stage decorated with plastic palm trees that had trunks shaped like the Eiffel Tower. A banner read
LIGHTEN UP PARIS!
in bright orange letters. The band was in full swing with dancers and coordinated back-up singers and a skinny little vocalist who was about three-quarters man and one-quarter hair. He wore a gold cape and puss-in-boots shoes with buckles. His back-up singers wore matching outfits in different colours, each representing a suit of cards as they dipped, turned, and spun like a machine. The dancers, dressed in
fleur de lis
bikinis, were shaking their hips like little dogs trying to dry off.

The singer was singing, “Shaaaade ... quit giving me shade, baby.”

The back-up singers did one final cake-mixer spin and landed in front of their mikes, singing, “You're raining on my parade,” as the music abruptly halted.

The dancers produced twirling umbrellas that spun to a blur, lifting them off the stage into the afternoon for a dazzling crowd-pleasing finish.

The singer remained on stage, and as the applause faded, he announced, “Ladies and gentlemen, mesdames et messieurs, please give a warm, and I mean warm welcome to the prefect of Paris, Luc Fiat!”

A man bounced up the steps, took the microphone, and waved to the cheering crowd. He wore a dazzling white suit with a golden sun emblazoned on the shoulders and rays extending down the back and sleeves. He wore silver cowboy boots and mirrored sunglasses in the shape of little suns. He smiled a long, thin, crescent smile that looked like it had drawstrings at the corners.

“Yessss. Ouiiiii. Merccci!”

He stretched out the words and nodded approvingly at the crowd.

“Today is a special day for all Parisians. Today we say ‘
non
' to the grey clouds and ‘pooh' to the rain. We will borrow a cup of California and a hint of Hawaii to scare away the grey. Today, my fellow citizens, we lighten up!”

At this, a screen unfurled behind him showing the Seine and one of the tourist boats, the
bateau mouche
. The crowd ooo'd as the dancers from the band sailed by on orange water-skis, waving, smiling, still holding their little parasols.

At the other end of the Champs Élysées, in the Place de la Concorde, fireworks went off in the shape of a giant happy face. A small plane was busily spelling out the words “Lighten Up.” The crowd seemed enthralled as Luc Fiat pointed toward the happy face that was melting to the ground and shouted, “It's up to you,
mes amis
, to lighten up old Paris.”

He bounded off the stage as quickly as he had arrived, down a set of stairs toward the backstage area. I noticed, almost hidden behind the screen, two identical characters in long black trench coats, faces hidden by their fedora hats with the glow of cigarettes the only sign of life. The coats seemed to billow like smoke as they parted a backstage curtain to allow Luc Fiat to exit before they followed right behind. Curious, I eased through the dispersing crowd and pushed apart a couple of wooden barriers. I peeked inside a large tent. At that precise moment, Fiat turned to look back and briefly caught my eye. He registered surprise but quickly disappeared into the folds of heavy grey material. Then I heard a voice that sounded like it came from a barrel.

“Nice work, Monsieur Fiat, you got the touch,” followed by a deep laugh.

A thin voice hissed in reply, “Oh shut up, Scar, and help me down.”

I tried to slow my pounding heart as I heard a scraping, accompanied by a damp, fishy smell. The voices echoed then suddenly stopped. I eased around a tent flap and into the back as my eyes got used to the dark. Nothing. No one. How could that be? There was only one way out. I walked around, and all I saw was a couple of cigarette butts ground out beside a manhole cover.

“Can I help you?” a man asked, putting his hand on my shoulder, making me jump about a foot in the air. He was carrying a broom and wearing a “City of Paris LIGHTEN UP!” sweatshirt.

“No,” I replied, wondering what I was doing there anyway. “I just wanted to meet Monsieur Fiat, that's all,” I blurted.

He smiled and nodded. “Let me help you find your way out, mademoiselle. I don't think anyone actually meets Luc Fiat, at least not with those two giant bookends that always follow him around standing in the way.”

On my way back to Rudee's, I thought I'd sample a guacamole croissant at one of the stands set up on the Champs Élysées. It wasn't very good. Or maybe I wasn't very hungry.

Back at the Russian church, Rudee was in his room, stirring something purple and foamy on his little burner. Nearby sat an open jar of pickled herring and a fork. He wiped the corner of his mouth. “Hungry, little one?”

“No,” I lied. The walk home had made me realize how famished I was, but then the aroma of Rudee's room quickly took care of that. I told him about the rally. He brightened and said, “Now, this is what we need. I tried to drive by, but I couldn't get close; I saw the happy head firecracker. You know, Paris has been looking darker to me lately, and anything that can polish our eyes is good.”

I felt like I was starting to understand him. I tried to tell him about Luc Fiat's bodyguards and his odd disappearance, but Rudee seemed more interested in the contents of his pot. I climbed the staircase to my attic room and was watching the sun ease down over the chimneys and church spires, changing everything into rosy silhouettes when Rudee called up to me, “Hey, American shrimplette, do you want to come with me to take Sashay to the club?”

I didn't have time to ask who or where, because he was heading loudly down the stairs. As I grabbed my sweatshirt, it occurred to me that Rudee seemed to have forgotten about sending me back to my school group. Penelope would be more than curious as to where I was, but I knew she'd cover for me. I followed him through the church garden to the shed where his cab was waiting. We backed down the vine-covered alley and into the cobblestone street. Rudee changed the lighting in his cab from purple to a soft gold and was fishing through a box of tapes under the seat as he navigated the traffic. He muttered to himself till he found what he was looking for.

“Rudee?” I felt like I was interrupting some ritual.

“Sorry, little one, I forgot you were here.”

“Who's Sashay?”

He slowly turned his head to stare at me, wordlessly at first. His normally pointy brow seemed to arch out even further from his face, making his eyes look like they were staring out at me from inside a pair of caves. “Didn't your daddy tell you anything? Sashay D'Or,
la reine des rêves
, the queen of dreams, the most enchanting woman in all of Parisian nightlife, you know nothing about? Ah, Sashay....”

Rudee seemed to glaze over for a moment, with a distant, almost sad expression. “Sorry, Mac, where was I? Sashay, of course. She knows ways of taking people away with that swirly girl dance of hers. You remember things ...” his voice trailed off before the fire in it returned, “… she was the toast of all Paris. Now she works for people who don't appreciate her. No one does ... like I do.”

At this moment the radio cut in with a burst of static. “Fifty-two.
Cinquante-deux
. Are you there?”

Rudee grabbed his microphone. “
Oui
, I'm here after all.”

“Rudee, you little cockroach,
ça va
?” A crusty female voice came from the speaker.

“Yes,
oui
, Madeleine, you old sea hag,
ça va
.”

A cackling laugh, part static, part cough, shot back, “I've got a new recipe for curing baldness,
mon ami
.”

“Really?” Rudee sounded cautious but interested.

“Listen, take equal parts goose liver and very ripe brie and let it sit beside your bed for one month. Then spread it on your head and sit under a lamp for six hours, and do not move.”

Rudee was taking notes while driving.

“And the next morning, my shiny-domed driver, you'll have a full head of hair.”

“That's it?” Rudee couldn't hide the hope in his voice.

“Oh, just one last thing. You need ... one very gullible bald cabbie.”

A chorus of laughter echoed over the radio. Rudee turned the colour of his beet stew and slammed down the handset.

At this point we swung into a narrow street and stopped in front of a darkened storefront that read “Musée D'
É
charpe.” I'd never heard of a scarf museum. Could Erik Satie's place be smaller than this? On the floor above, a curtain parted slightly then closed, and the lights went out. Rudee jumped out of the cab, opened the back door, and stood waiting while a woman whisked from between the buildings and into the back seat. I turned to get my first look at the “queen of dreams.” I could barely focus on her face for the wild profusion of hair and scarves in the dim golden glow of Rudee's cab.

“Sashay, this is ...” began Rudee.

“Mac,” she said in a whisper, “
enchanté,
” and extended a hand contained in a silky glove that travelled far up her sleeve.

“Hi,” was all I could manage as her eyes, located deep beneath waxy lashes, found mine.

Before we could go any further, Rudee hit the gas and pulled away, pushing “play” and filling the cab with the sound of a velvety male singer. In the mirror, Sashay looked like she was somewhere else. Rudee said nothing, so I thought I'd better do the same. We eased through the streets of St. Germain till we approached a cluster of cars and people standing in groups dressed for a night on the town, laughing and talking happily. On one side of a narrow passage, I could see the lights of the club gleaming on the polished steel and stone exterior. The sign read
MOULIN D'OR
and below it was a poster of Sashay surrounded by lights looking like she had just emerged from a silver cloud. The groups parted as we slowly drove past the entrance then stopped in front of an alley leading to the side of the building. Above a dimly lit doorway, I could just make out a sign that read
STAGE DOOR
. Sashay departed without a word and went in.

There was a man in a long black coat in the shadows by the door, standing very still. I might not have noticed him if it weren't for the glow of the cigarette under the brim of his hat.