wearing leather boots that fit. I’m not so lucky. The chick who owns the shoes I’m wearing must have only four toes.
I shout at her to stop, but she looks back at me and laughs.
“You won’t get away with this!” I yell, taking off after her. I see the elusive creature weaving down the boulevard, paying no attention to whether or not I’m following her. She knows the streets better than I do, but I can’t lose her. She’s my only link to Paul Borquet.
I kick my stride into high gear, pushing myself to the max. I ignore the Exercise Overload red light flashing in my brain. Anger, like good sex, has a way of making you endure. I’m not even gasping for breath. I see the street thief about twenty feet in front of me. My long legs pumping, arms swinging, red velvet cloak blowing up around my bare legs like a battle flag. I’m no marathon runner, but when I’m desperate I can move out. Fast.
I catch sight of her turning onto a crooked little street so narrow only pedestrians and baby carriages can fit through its open-air portal. Pumped with adrenaline, I rush down the street. Where did she go? Inside a house? No, everything’s shuttered up tight. Where then? The scene in the street looks like something out of an old black-and-white film noir. Plain, multistoried row houses, broken stoops, uneven cobblestones.
I shiver as a misty breeze tickles my bare neck. Sweat oozes down my cheek and settles on my lower lip. Salt mixes with what’s left of my pink lip gloss. I lick off the sweat and wrinkle my nose. The pickpocket has disappeared, but her dirty smell lingers in the air. I race down the street, looking everywhere at once. I’m not sufficiently paranoid to think I’m being led into a trap.
I dart into one doorway, then another, trying to follow her tracks. I bet she’s watching me from her hiding place, laughing at me, waiting for me to give up. I won’t.
Won’t. Get it, you old ragpicker?
Because the street is bending and winding, with crumbling Gothic stonework caving in on either side of me, and because the alley is the only escape route visible to my eye, I surrender to my female impulse. I proceed without caution into what I believe is a small alleyway. Deserted. Quiet. I walk up and down the alley, going a little deeper into the darkness. Any excuse not to go to back to the hotel and face my mother and the French police and end this thrill ride. I don’t want to lose the feel-good vibes surging through me from my fantasy fuck.
I’m having too much fun.
I cock my head to one side, looking for any sign of the old ragpicker. I slow down, painfully aware I’ve lost her. Just when I was getting started. I’m pumped with energy, like I could run all day. I don’t turn back, not even when a cold wind penetrates my red velvet cloak, slicing through me like the steel blade of a knife. My teeth chatter. Dampness inches under my clothes, pricking my skin with tiny bumps. The alley leads me into the back entrance of a large, run-down building.
A curious urge guides my footsteps into the cool vastness of the gigantic wrought-iron framed hall. I crane my neck and look upward. An awesome panoramic view. Dizzying. Breathtaking. It’s as big as an airplane hangar, stretching off to a misty vanishing point. The gigantic umbrellalike building with wrought-iron-and-glass roofing looks old, very old, and goes on for what appears to be miles. I count as many as ten pavilions with iron girders and skylight roofs, as well as large cellars for storage. Then I hear voices. I turn around and see merchants unloading their crates of wares and piling them ten, maybe twelve feet high, between rusty-looking scales and anywhere else they can find room.
At the same time, a steady congestion of traffic of hand carts and vendors passes by me, delivering their produce or selling their trade outside the market to the early morning shoppers. What time is it…5:00, 6:00 a.m.? Knife sharpeners, dog washers, even a fuzzy burro pulling a cart of rush-bottomed chairs with the rush badly broken, passes by me. Retail meat sellers, coffee, soup and milk stall keepers, fruit merchants and oyster sellers hustle and jostle each other for the best position to sell their wares.
I sniff the air. The scents of mint, thyme and tomatoes all mix together under my nose. It’s overpowering. Rough, raw, lusty sights and smells and sounds. Rats running in and out of the vegetable sweepings strewn about on the ground. Prostitutes soliciting from shadowy corridors. Accordion players piping out a melancholy tune. Mountains of pea-green cabbages. Orange pumpkins. Crates of ripe red tomatoes.
Funny-looking goose bumps pop up on my bare arms. Pointy, like needle marks.
Where the hell am I?
The crack of a whip catches my attention. I spin around, alert. I see a man weighing at least 250 pounds with long, dark, curly hair and a big, black beard hurrying up what I assume is his poor wife. The pitiful woman is attached to the cart by a harness and pulling a heavy load of vegetables, her labored breaths making each step painful.
“Hurry up, bitch!” the man screams at the woman, then turning around he snarls at me. “Out of my way, stupid!” The man pushes by me, cursing.
“Watch who you’re calling stupid, you patapouf!”
“You whore!” he yells.
Crack! comes the sound of a whip striking a wooden post near me. Startled, my heart pounding, I can’t move. The impact is so hard the splinters break free and breeze by my cheek, grazing it slightly. Blood trickles down my face and into my mouth, but I don’t taste it. I spin around and see this same ferocious bear of a man coming straight at me, wielding a whip in his hand.
“Arrête! Stop, thief!” he yells, “or I’ll shred the flesh from your bones with my whip.”
“I’m not a thief!” I cry out. The nerve of him. Just because I called him a tub of lard, he calls me a thief. Blood curdles in my veins when I see the man raise his arm and crack his whip in the air like a dragon’s tail. I swallow hard. This time he won’t miss.
I fling myself on the ground and cover my head with my arms, rocking back and forth, ignoring the sting of wooden scraps and sawdust cutting through my cloak. I’m shaking, my teeth chattering. I clasp both hands to my head, striving to understand what’s happening to me. It’s harder to hit a moving target, so I roll into a dark corner away from the man with the whip, then get to my feet.
I bolt through the market, bumping into carts and knocking over crates of vegetables and fruit. I keep going. I have to get out of here. How to escape? The market entrance is blocked by piles of crates stacked up high over my head. I look the other way. Blocked as well. I run faster, experiencing a rush to my brain I don’t understand.
With the wind ruffling the stray wisps of hair escaping from my hood, I keep running until—
“Not so fast, my young thief.”
“Stop calling me a thief!” I spin around as a strong hand grabs me by my red velvet cloak and grips me so tightly I can’t breathe. I hear the crackling of his long cape hitting the ground before the heavy woolen material slaps against the backs of my calves, stinging me. The man’s other arm goes firmly around my waist and he lifts me off the ground as if I were as light as a poupée, a doll.
He carries me into the shadowy doorway near a restaurant with the picturesque name au Chien qui Fume, The Smoking Dog. I sniff the air. The bitter smell of alcohol lingers on the man’s breath. And licorice. I squirm, twisting my body this way and that, pressing my hip into his groin, but I can’t see the man’s face.
“Let me go!” I cry out, irritated.
“Never. Now that I’ve found
