Black Diamond

toward the men’s room to check his appearance in the mirror.
    “Now I know it’s Christmas,” called Claire, the secretary, as he crossed the open-plan office. “Are you going to come down my chimney this year, Bruno?”
    “Your reindeer’s got a parking ticket,” chimed in Roberte, who looked after the Sécu, the social security paperwork.
    “Where’s my present?” called Josette as Bruno stompeddown the stairs, deciding that he’d skip looking in the mirror rather than go back through the gauntlet of the tired old jokes he heard every year.
    Bruno felt odd to be wearing such festive garments in sunshine, however thin and wintry the rays and however good the cause. He’d be teased about it in endless markets to come. But he strode into the rue de Paris, ringing his handbell and thrusting his collection box at stallholders and shoppers alike.
    “For the children of the sawmill,” he called out. “For the children of those who lost their jobs.”
    It seemed to work. One- and two-euro coins rattled into his tin and a few five-euro notes, one of them from a young, single man who had lost a sawmill job. Bruno thanked them all and turned down Vinh’s offer of one of his hot
nems
as he strolled on to rattle his box at Léopold. As he paused at the stall, Bruno was jostled by two young men in a hurry who seemed to come from nowhere, and he half fell over Léopold’s stall of cheap leather belts. Turning, he saw that the two men were Asians, presumably acquaintances of Vinh.
    But then the first one pushed Vinh’s wife aside and delivered a vicious chop to Vinh’s neck with the side of his hand. The second man, burdened down with something heavy, staggered up to Vinh’s stall and with his companion launched the contents of a large bucket into the display trays containing
nems
and
lumpia
, the samosas and prepared curries and wind-dried ducks. They tipped the last of some thick black liquid into the bubbling deep fryer, hurled the bucket into what was left of the trays and began kicking at Vinh and his wife where they lay huddled on the ground.
    Overcoming his surprise and outrage, Bruno realized he was carrying his handbell and launched himself at the pair of them. In an instant, he knew that his costume was the perfectdisguise. How could Father Christmas possibly be a danger? Bruno slammed one of the attackers on the side of the head with the bell, and without bothering to watch him fall he slammed the collection box, heavy with coins, into the back of the neck of the other. Just before he connected the man twisted, and Bruno hit his shoulder instead, and he turned to launch a swift sideways kick at Bruno’s groin.
    The thick skirt of the Father Christmas costume saved him, and he raised the handbell to hit again. But the young Asian had managed to win enough time to step back and pull out a khaki-colored stick, about the size of a runner’s baton. Bruno recognized it from his army days, a stun grenade, all noise and stunning flare of light but not lethal. Yet it would probably serve to ignite whatever black oil now drenched the remains of Vinh’s stall.
    Bruno used the only weapon he had, hurling the handbell at the Asian’s face. Then scooping two long belts from Léopold’s stall he used them as whips, aiming the flicking leather at the Asian’s eyes before darting forward to get between him and the oil that was now flooding over the prostrate figures of Vinh and his wife. But a hand was gripping his ankle and holding him back—the other Asian. Bruno stomped down hard while constantly flicking his leather belts and shouting for support. He felt rather than saw Léopold alongside him and the hold on his ankle gave way so he could move again. But the Asian now had a grip on the leather belts with one hand. At least he could not ignite the grenade.
    Bruno dropped the belts and picked up a thick bolt of brightly colored African cloth from Léopold’s stall. Thrusting it before him like a battering ram, he charged at the Asian, forcing him back into the tiny alley that led to the rue Gambetta. Behind the retreating figure, Bruno saw a car, its doorsopen and with another Asian at the wheel, leaning out and calling for the others to join him. Bruno’s opponent ran back toward the car, clambering in and shouting in a language Bruno didn’t understand.
    But Bruno knew the geography of his town. With the market stalls and the parked ranks of the vendors’ vans blocking the side streets, there was