Paris: The Novel

far?”
    “You’ll see.”
    At last they came to a high chamber, almost like a cave.
    “This is it,” said Luc. They put the body down. Then he raised the lamp high. And Thomas let out a cry of fear.
    For they weren’t alone.
    All around the walls, the skeletons lay. Some of them were propped almost in a sitting position, staring at them in their tattered clothes, as though at some final supper in the dark.
    “Do you know who they are?” asked Luc.
    “No.”
    “At the end of the Commune, forty years ago, there was the famous last fight of the Communards at Père Lachaise. But before that, a party of Communards at Montmartre retreated into the gypsum mines. And instead of going in to finish them off, the army dynamited the entrance of the mine. They knew there was no way out of this section. I found other skeletons in the passages, but I think these fellows made a compact anddecided to shoot themselves all together.” He turned to the corpse of the girl. “Help me get her clothes off, then we’ll drag her over to the wall.”
    It wasn’t pleasant work, but they did it. At one moment, Thomas gave a little gasp, and Luc said, “What?” and Thomas said, “Nothing.” When they had her propped naked against the wall, Luc carefully removed the tattered remains of a Communard’s coat and wrapped it around her.
    “In a year or two, she’ll be a skeleton like the rest of them.”
    “If anyone ever examines the shed …”
    “I thought of that. I can cover the side of the hill up again. Close the entrance. It should be all right.”
    Thomas frowned.
    “Just one thing I don’t understand. Why did you ever make the arrangement with the shed and the tunnel in the first place?”
    Luc paused.
    “I thought it would be a good place to hide things. That is, if I ever wanted to.”
    “Oh,” said Thomas.

    When they got back into the house, Luc said that Thomas should go.
    “I’ll be lighting a fire in the grate tonight,” he explained. “Got to burn the clothes and the tablecloths. Then I’ll check the carpet. You need to be well away before I start.”
    “I delivered a carpet, that’s all. I’ve got a family to support,” said Thomas.
    “I know.” Luc looked up at him. “When I was a little boy, you came and saved me from the Dalou gang. And you fought for me. I never forgot that, you know.”
    Thomas shrugged.
    “You were my little brother. That’s all.”
    “You just saved my life tonight.”
    “I won’t do it again,” Thomas warned.
    “I’ll never ask you.” He looked at Thomas with sad eyes. “Do you still love me, brother?”
    Thomas didn’t answer.
    “Well,” said Luc quietly, “I love you.”
    Thomas left.
    As he took the cart back down the hill, he reflected on all that he’dseen. It seemed Édith was right about his brother. If he wanted a secret hiding place, then he was probably a receiver of stolen goods, and possibly a thief, just as she’d suggested.
    Even worse was something else he’d noticed. As they were stripping the girl in the lamplight, he’d suddenly realized that there were bruises around her mouth and nose that didn’t look like the bruising from being hit. Only one thing he knew of produced bruises like that.
    If someone was deliberately suffocated.
    His brother may have hit the girl. She may have banged the back of her head. But her death hadn’t come from that. Luc had suffocated her.
    His brother had just made him a party to murder.

    For three days he wondered whether to go to the police. But the risk was too great. What might they do to him?
    A week later, Luc came by to see them, but only briefly. As he left, he signaled to Thomas to walk down the street with him.
    “The police came by. Asked me if I’d seen the girl. I said I thought she’d come by late in the week, and I had an idea she spoke of leaving town. But I’ve heard that before from these girls, I told them, and they usually show up again. They asked me if I knew where she came from. Not a clue, I said. They weren’t very interested in her, I can tell you.”
    “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Thomas quietly.
    “Don’t worry,” said Luc, “nor do I.”

    And as the weeks went by, they heard nothing more. Winter came, and the girl was forgotten. Just before Christmas, snow fell, covering all that was dark beneath the streets of Paris; and on the day after Christmas, the sun came out, and the snow gleamed as white as the church of Sacré Coeur, high on the