The Same River Twice (50 page)

Rachel frowned and turned to Groot. “Are we? A maiden voyage?”

“I was considering it. Though only if it would please you.”

“But what about Max’s film?”

“This would be part of it,” Odile said. “He was going to tell you, but I guess he hasn’t gotten around to it yet.” Fascinated, she saw she was veering giddily into improvisation and reckless untruth. She had no idea what she might say next.

“So they’re fugitives,” Groot said. “How did you leave it with them?”

“They’ll be here at midnight.”

Rachel and Groot looked at each other, consulting silently. It occurred to Odile that they would very likely be getting married after all.

Groot pushed himself away from the table and stretched.
“Ja
, okay. I think we can do this. If Rachel agrees, of course.” Stifling a yawn, he stood, laid his napkin beside his plate, and went below, leaving the women to talk.

“I know I’m asking a lot,” said Odile, “but I have to live with myself.”

“It’s all right. These Russians, though, they’re the ones who firebombed us?”

“Yes.”

“And the three people who want to go to England. There’s the doctor whose picture I saw. But the other two?”

“One is the guy I went to Moscow with to pick up the flags. The other’s his girlfriend. They’re all working together, more or less.”

“Sounds complicated.”

“Maybe, but not for us. As long as we get them out of here.”

“I see.” Rachel took off her glasses, polished the lenses on an edge of the tablecloth, and put them back on. Peering at her friend curiously, she said, “Anything else you want to tell me?”

In the distance, a lone siren bloomed.

“No,” Odile replied. She glanced reflexively at her watch, then attempted a smile. “Not really.”

• • •

MAX HAD BEEN WAITING
no more than ten minutes when Jacques pulled up in the Citroën and got out. The two men stood wordlessly together, taking in the light.

“I’ve never seen anything like it. Will it photograph? Is it real?”

“A full moon refracted by fog,” said Max. “No shadows. I’ve never seen this either.”

“What are we shooting? Do we have a scene?”

“I don’t know.” Max threw his cigar into the street. “If not, we’ll make one up. But let’s get down there before anything changes.”

They unloaded the cameras and sound equipment, then headed down the stone steps to the quai.

“I think the best idea is for you to set up right there, by the retaining wall, so you can get the boat as a whole. I’ll take the other camera on board and see what’s happening. Rachel and Odile were topside until a little while ago—I saw them from across the river—but they must’ve gone below, probably to join Groot. I’ll roust them.”

“Yes, this is good.”

“But Jacques, I want you to use your judgment. If you think you’ve got enough from your angle, or if I can’t get them up into the light soon enough, or even if you just see something good that I’m missing, come on board. Quietly. You’ll know what to do.”

Nodding, Jacques surveyed the scene, mapping it out in his mind. “And that blue light on top there? What does that mean?”

“It means that God is a camera,” said Max, who’d forgotten he was still drunk.

On the quai, he watched Jacques set up his vidcam and tripod, then train it on the
Nachtvlinder
. After taking a look through the viewfinder himself, Max was satisfied. “Okay, ready?”

Jacques nodded. “Let’s do it.”

Going up the gangway, Max took care to make as little noise as possible. He thought it odd that those on board wouldn’t be topside in this light—once-in-a-lifetime light, the light of rapture and unforeseeable outcomes. Of course, he couldn’t expect others to see what he pictured, at least not until he put a frame around it. And even then, how many? But it didn’t matter. Doing it was the thing.

Once aboard, he could hear Rachel, Groot, and Odile conversing softly below, and he had to stop for a moment to ask himself what, exactly, he wanted from them. So much of what had just happened—the auction, his encounter with Kukushkin and Véronique, his phone call with Eddie—had
yet to sort itself out in his mind that he was operating more impulsively than usual, operating, it had to be admitted, like someone half drunk. Yet he thought maybe impulse was just what he needed right now. Forces larger than himself, whose true nature remained unclear, had allowed him a glimpse of the world as it really was, and all his instincts told him to pursue it with every resource he could muster.
I know more than I know
, he thought. He waited a little longer for something to contradict him—reason, perhaps, or ordinary good sense—but nothing did. He shouldered his equipment and descended the companionway steps.

The conversation below ceased immediately at his approach, and all three rose guiltily to their feet. Looking from one to another of his prospective subjects, Max saw an expression quite like shock on their faces. He decided to let the moment play out. Without comment, he considered his surroundings: the dimly lit compartment, the river-facing portholes brighter than the compartment, the nautical magazines neatly stowed in a bamboo rack, the map of the Seine framed and bolted flush to the bulkhead, the bank of wooden storage lockers, the pair of canaries in a cage not yet shrouded for the night, the cantaloupe rolling listlessly about in a bowl as the
Nachtvlinder
pitched in the wake of a passing boat. Max’s eyes settled on Rachel. She looked stricken.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I guess I should’ve knocked.”

Groot was quick to intervene. “No, no. You just surprised us. That’s all.” He made a move to help Max with his equipment, but Max shook his head fractionally and he backed off. “The light,” Max said. “I thought maybe we could shoot a couple of—”

But now Odile stepped forward, quite composed again, and as she looked him in the eye something like a memory came hurtling back to him. Yet it was more immediate than a memory, it was her voice in his ear, saying, as it had that early spring afternoon, topside on this very vessel, when the two of them were in easy harmony still:
Enough. When the time comes, you’ll do what must be done. I require it, and you won’t fail me
.

To his immense relief, he understood that now was that time.

“Max,” she said simply.

WHEN TURNER’S CONVERSATION
with Odile came so abruptly to an end, he’d redialed at once, only to get her voice mail on the first ring. This he took to mean that her phone had been switched off, whether by herself or someone else, and as thoughts of the evening’s developments ricocheted
through his head, he commenced, in his agitation, to walk the moonlit city streets at random, oblivious to both direction and purpose. By the time he got a grip on himself, in the eighteenth arrondissement, a street sign informed him, even though he already knew, that he was on rue de la Goutte d’Or. He wondered briefly why there weren’t more people around, especially given the extraordinary light, and in a neighborhood known for its night trade. Then he saw, and realized he’d been seeing for some time now, an unusual number of police on the street—plainclothes and uniformed, on foot and in squad cars, with the occasional riot van parked inconspicuously in an alley. He hesitated, tapping his forefinger against his pursed lips as he pivoted slowly to survey the scene. Then he headed south toward the river.

At first he kept to the main boulevards—Magenta, Fayette, Haussmann—but before long grew uncomfortably aware that the belt-and-tape holster he’d rigged for his gun was designed more for concealment than for access—a definite disadvantage, should there actually be a moment of need. He turned down a side street, then another, before sheepishly slipping into a half-darkened doorway.

Unbuttoning his shirt, he transferred the gun to the waistband of his trousers, in front, at the left, then buttoned his suit jacket over it. He knew he was behaving like a character in a movie but so now was everyone else—all over the world, every waking hour, without even thinking about it. The times encouraged people to magnify their view of themselves, and, like it or not, you had to accommodate. He stepped again into the street.

“Watch out!” cried a voice closing fast from behind.

Turner leapt back onto the sidewalk just in time to avoid being run down by a helmeted bicyclist in black leather.

“Moron!” the man shouted over his shoulder as he sped off.

“Asshole!” Turner called after him, then continued south.

If, as he sometimes suspected, there would come a day of deliverance for people like himself, people so rabid to live that they knew neither up nor down, right nor left, then maybe fear wasn’t the survival mechanism he’d imagined it to be. Maybe, instead, it was the problem. A hindrance to what would otherwise happen. But how could you tell? Speculation did no good, that much was obvious. And in the end, of course, fear or no fear, the same fate awaited everyone. Or so one was led to believe.

Moment by moment, then, block by block, Odile seeped back into his thoughts until she eventually displaced all others. He grew more confident. Despite her efforts to discourage him, obvious from the start, he remained
undeterred in his pursuit. He believed she loved him, even if she wished it were otherwise. And people floundered, they changed their minds, outside events intervened without warning. Why shouldn’t he have a life with her? He felt it within his power to make this happen. Anyway, he had to try. He owed it to himself, a changed man, and he owed it to Odile, the woman who’d changed him. Nothing else would do.

Rounding the corner onto rue des Halles, he saw a group of police halfway down the block, taking counsel together, their vehicles obstructing the street. Unpleasantly aware of the weapon jammed into his waistband, he crossed the street to avoid the officers, one of whom called out to him.

He stopped in his tracks, and the cop dashed across the pavement to have a word with him.

“Good evening, Officer,” Turner said. “Is there something wrong?”

“As a precautionary measure, there is a civil alert, yes, and that is something we must all take seriously. Your identity card, please.”

Reaching into his breast pocket, Turner produced his wallet, removed his identification card, and handed it to him.

The policeman looked him over with care, his gaze lingering thoughtfully at the waist, where Turner’s jacket was buttoned tight. Then, after a quick, hard glance at his face, the officer shifted his attention to the card. “Where are you going tonight, sir?”

“To my home. I live in—”

“I can see where you live,” the officer said curtly, then handed back the card. “Go there directly, no stops.”

“Yes, of course. As quickly as possible.” Turner hesitated. “Should one be alarmed?”

For the first time the officer seemed to ease up slightly. He looked evenly into Turner’s eyes and, with no suggestion of levity, replied, “Sir! One should never be alarmed. One should be alert.”

“Well said.” Turner glanced at his watch. “So, with your permission, I’ll get going.”

“That’s a very good idea.” His interest in Turner exhausted, he jogged back to where his fellow officers were gathered.

Turner hurried on and did not look back. But he wasn’t going home.

TOPSIDE
on the
Nachtvlinder
, temporarily united in their desires, Rachel, Groot, and Odile assembled for a scene that Max had yet to glimpse or invent. The fog was still rolling in and the light was brighter than ever, but
with no idea when the moon might set, he couldn’t bear to lose any camera time. Each wasted second hurt.

Turning toward the quai, he gestured for Jacques to keep shooting. From his assistant’s vantage, the freshly painted boat would be blending more and more into the overall whiteness, even partly disappearing into it.

“Where do you want us?” asked Rachel.

Max led them to the river side of the boat, stationing Odile amidships, just out of camera range. Groot and Rachel he took closer to the stern, where the light was brightest. When he had them arranged to his liking, up against the railing, bodies half turned toward each other, he put the light meter to their faces, took a reading, and retreated behind the camera to frame the shot. Satisfied, he drew himself up in somewhat priestly fashion to address his principals.

“Okay. This will be a little different from what we’ve been doing, because I won’t speak. I won’t ask questions, and I won’t be a factor. But don’t let that worry you—quite the opposite. Once we start, you’ll be free to do or say anything you want. You can even think of yourself as someone else, if that appeals to you or helps you get to where you need to be. What I do ask is that you keep things moving, physically and verbally, following your gut. Don’t think, just let it out. Ignore me and accommodate to whatever seems real. Understand?”

He inspected each of them in turn. Meeting Odile’s gaze, he experienced a thrill of complicity. Whatever happened now would happen to them both. They’d respond as one. And as things had been when the two of them had first met, so would they be again. The readiness was all.

“Two scripted moments only,” Max went on. “First, Rachel, I want you to slap Groot as hard as you can on the cheek. The right one, since you’re left-handed. Is that okay with both of you?”

They looked at each other for a moment, then nodded.

“Second, when I give the signal to Odile, she’ll come into the action. Incorporate her however you like. Odile, follow your impulses. Other developments—and as you know, there will
always
be other developments—should be treated naturally. Oh, and I’ve got Jacques down there on the quai shooting too, in case we need some backup footage. He may come aboard later. But ignore him just as you do me.”

Max, though hoping for no questions, left a short interval in which they might be posed. None were. “So, guys, that’s it.” He put his eye to the viewfinder. “Everybody ready?” He took their silence as assent. “Rachel, it’s all you.”

Inhaling deeply, she clenched her teeth and drew her left hand back, palm open. Max started to film. The slap, when it came, was much harder than anyone but Max had expected, snapping Groot’s head around to face the camera. But he didn’t flinch or move away. He didn’t touch his cheek. Max slowly tightened the shot.