Rage in Paris by Kirby Williams

Author:Kirby Williams
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pushcart Press

Stanley had lent me his blue Citroën C4G Berline, which was the least conspicuous of his fleet of cars. The traffic was light but it was cold outside, and snow flurries were brushing against the windshield. I turned on the wipers and the heat. I kept myself awake by humming Armstrong’s trumpet riffs. Then Stanley’s soprano sax riffs. The music was coming back.

I reached Bosquet des Pins Street and parked the car behind a coal truck. Despite my fatigue, I’d been keeping my eyes peeled to make sure that I hadn’t been followed. As I walked toward the cutoff into the Bois de Boulogne, the first sign of trouble was the blaring of the sirens of the fire engines speeding past. They were stopped up ahead, surrounded by rubberneckers. I kept hearing the words “Etables incendiés,” stables burned down. People in this wealthy part of the sixteenth district of Paris were blaming the fires on the Communists, the Socialists, and the anarchists, although it was their own kind, the Fascists and the monarchists, who had been putting parts of Paris to the torch and trying to bring down the government.

“They’re even attacking horses now!” someone shouted indignantly, the Longchamps racetrack being nearby. I could sense the panic in the well-heeled people questioning the firemen. I kept thinking that these rich folks were the natural allies of the Count and his Fascist and royalist supporters. They had a deep blood memory of the French Revolution and the Paris Commune Workers’ Revolt of 1871. The events of last Tuesday had them feeling the blade of the guillotine, still in use for public executions, whispering on their necks. They could picture snipers perched in every leafy horse chestnut tree, aiming their guns at them. They were prepared to do anything to save their lives and their wealth, even if it meant going to war with their fellow Frenchmen. I reckoned that they would readily jump into bed with Hitler and Mussolini and the Count himself to halt the spread of the Red Menace in France.

I saw smoke and flames pouring from Stanley’s stables which were clearly visible now that the dense thicket concealing them had burned to a crisp. My heart started pounding as I thought of Daphne, and I sprinted toward the smoldering remains of the hideout. Scores of firemen were directing their hoses at it, and more firemen and policemen were arriving in waves, their sirens blaring. I spotted a young fireman with an elaborate mustache who was looking angrily at the rich gawkers commenting on the scene. Figuring that I was a working-class man like himself, he answered truthfully my fearful question about possible victims. “There are no victims,” he said. “Just razed, dilapidated stable blocks. There were some pieces of old furniture and some framed paintings that went up in flames. Perhaps they had some value. But, frankly, comrade, my lieutenant thinks that it’s the work of professional arsonists working for property developers who will now try to buy

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