The Emperor of Paris Read Online Free PDF Page B

games, the pair of you. Come in for supper before you freeze to death.
    Off you go, the grandfather said. We will try again next summer.
    The August downpour had settled to a fine drizzle. The Fournier men went off to scour the used bookshops near the university. Henri, halfway to his eleventh birthday and still in need of better spectacles, was left to mind the stall. Lingering puddles trickled off the lid.
    Henri slapped at a drip on the back of his head, then moved his stool away from the stall. He worried about the heat, the sky beginning to cloud again, the books warping behind him, the postcards moulding, the itch in his bottom. He stood, sat again, squirmed, scratched, shook out his legs. He adjusted his spectacles, looked along the quay, upstream, downstream. There was no sign of his father and grandfather, nor the sound of their cart creaking under the weight of more volumesno one would buy. Henri began pacing from one end of the stall to the other, running a hand over the books, his fingers bouncing across the spines.
    It was a game his grandfather had taught him, much to the dismay of his father, when Henri was hardly tall enough to reach the books. No peeking, the old man had said. Feel the books. When you think you are ready, make a selection.
    Henri did as he was told, eventually pulling a slim volume from the rows in the stall, holding it against his forehead. The object of the game was to describe the case without seeing it.
    The material, Henri. What do you feel? Fine linen or rough leather? Or both? And the stamping? The foil? You could try smelling it if you think it would help.
    Can anyone actually smell a good book, Grandfather?
    Of course not, the old man would bluster. All the buyer need do is hold it. As you are now. Let it rest in their hands. Curl fingers around the spine as if it were stitched for only them. Run a thumb along the soft edges of its pages. When they hold it, Henri, is when you have them. After that they can smell it all they like.
    Henri chose a book and put it to his nose. A whiff of lavender. Henri pictured himself standing in a field ofpurple flowers. He turned at the sound of pounding hooves. A huge black horse sped past him at full gallop, the rider hunched in close to the mane, one arm brandishing a heavy sword. Henri saw the cruciform of a crusader sewn across the back of the rider’s tunic. In the distance a castle smouldered with the fires of a siege.
    Henri thought of purple.
    He opened his eyes. The case was calfskin, as black as tar. The stamped design on the boards was ornate: tiny flowers in bloom, a twist of stems and leaves flowing across the case, over the spine and onto the back. The title had been foiled in copper, mottled now with the damp. Henri took another sniff. There was a faint odour of smoke.
    His grandfather would have shaken his head. Purple, Henri? Wherever would you get such a notion?
    Henri moved the stool closer to the stall and stretched his legs. He leaned against the green wood, pressed his spectacles against his nose, and opened the book.
    Chapter One
.
    Henri’s eyes kept snagging as the first paragraphs lazed their way to a beginning. A couple was strolling
gay and carefree
along a country riverbank. They approached from a distance, she in a
charmingly lovely
dress, the colourof
spring’s own buttercups
; her hair
as rich and luminous as glittering chestnuts
. A wide-brimmed straw hat,
as graceful as the heavens
, shielded her
youthful and sun-kissed
face from the heat. Her companion was
crisply turned out
in morning suit, gloves, cravat, a pair of
immaculate spats
. His hand searched
romantically, longingly
to hold hers. And yet there were
morose and hateful
clouds in the sky, threatening
the freshest bloom of love
.
    As he read
spring’s own buttercups
, Henri cringed.
    By page 20 the writer had finally gotten things moving. Henri could feel trouble rising from the typescript, the snags turning to jolts.
    The lovers drew near, their voices