Mira's Diary Read online

  “Come on,” Malcolm whispered. “Let’s light a candle for Mom.”

  “Why?” I asked, annoyed that he’d jarred me out of the peaceful rhythm of the cathedral. “She isn’t dead, just gone.”

  But the flickering flames of the long white candles mesmerized me. I wanted to light one for myself. I didn’t have any euros yet, but I slipped some quarters into the slotted metal box, lit a candle from the flame of its brother, and impaled it on one of the metal spikes branching out in front of a side altar. I wondered how many people had done this same simple thing and what they’d prayed for. A good harvest, a healthy baby, a new cow? I knew Malcolm was praying for Mom to come back, but I wasn’t sure I wanted that. Would I forgive her if she called us tomorrow, said she was sorry for leaving?

  I stared into the flames, searching for what I really wanted. An answer. I prayed to know the truth—good, bad, or ugly. I wanted to know why.

  Dad found us standing there, his guidebook open in his hands.

  “Lose the book,” I begged. “You’re making us look like dumb tourists.”

  “We are dumb tourists, and this book is useful. It says here that you can climb a tower to go out to a walkway above the roof where the gargoyles are lined up. Let’s find the one from Mom’s postcard.”

  “You think Mom’s waiting for us there?” Malcolm rolled his eyes. He’s an expert eye-roller, believe me.

  “Of course not! I like gargoyles, that’s all.” Dad tucked the guidebook into the messenger bag slung over his shoulder. “And I’ll speak to you in French so we won’t seem like tourists.”

  “You don’t have to go that far,” I said. My French is pretty basic. Bonjour, merci, and je m’appelle Mira. Dad’s wasn’t much better. Mom was fluent. But she wasn’t here.

  We went outside to join the line that snaked alongside the flank of the cathedral. The last time I’d been in a line like this was at Great America, waiting to get on the Ultimate Drop ride. Now I was climbing a narrow, twisting stairway in a Gothic tower but I was just as nervous, scared almost. It was stupid to think we’d find Mom next to some gargoyle. Or a hidden message. But I couldn’t get rid of the feeling that we were closer to her, that something was about to happen that would change everything.

  After the cramped darkness of the tower, it was a relief to be out on the walkway. The view was amazing. All Paris lay spread out before us, the Seine river, bridges crisscrossing it, the towers of the fortress-like Conciergerie where nobles were imprisoned during the French Revolution, the Eiffel Tower, Gothic spires and slate roofs. It looked like something from a Madeline book. I almost expected to see nuns leading two straight lines of little girls dressed in blue and white with black hats perched on their heads.

  All along the walkway, stone monsters crouched. In most churches gargoyles were fancy gutters, covering the spouts that channeled rainwater away from the walls. In Notre Dame, the gargoyles were simply decoration. Dad suggested they might be there to protect the cathedral from evil spirits. To me, they looked like evil spirits themselves. Still, I couldn’t resist drawing them.

  “Why have creepy creatures on a church? It’s like inviting demons rather than repelling them,” I said. “Why did Mom pick a gargoyle postcard?”

  “She’s protecting us from evil, obviously,” Malcolm drawled.

  “Don’t make fun that way,” Dad said. “Maybe she really is. You don’t know.”

  “You don’t either,” Malcolm snapped. “You just want to forgive and forget.”

  I didn’t want a fight. Malcolm thought Dad was a doormat, letting Mom step all over him. Dad thought Malcolm was rushing to judge what he didn’t understand. I thought they should both shut up. After all, we were in Paris, Mom or no Mom.

  It seemed safer to walk away than try to stop them, so I squeezed past and studied the weird creatures perched on the edge of the walkway. Some gargoyles looked like bird-beasts, others like lion or wolf creatures. And there, right in front of me, was the one from Mom’s postcard, a really creepy humanoid, reptilian thing with a stubby unicorn horn.

  I knew you weren’t supposed to touch the art, but I couldn’t help myself. I felt drawn to the jutting brow, the goatish beard. The thing seemed so real, as if the demonic eyes would blink any minute. I reached out a finger and touched its shoulder, expecting the warmth of something alive. But the stone was cold, searingly cold, like ice. A shock ran through me as if I’d touched an electrical socket.

  Now this is the freaky part, and I’m not sure how to explain it. When I touched that gargoyle, I saw flashes of it being carved in some dusty workshop by a pockmarked man in a leather vest. I saw it being hoisted onto the wall. I saw screaming mobs throwing torches and pulling down sculptures from the cathedral. I saw clouds race overhead, and the sun rise and set, each image passing so quickly in front of me that I couldn’t grasp any details. I felt dizzy with all the changes and thought I would puke.

  When it was over, I was alone on the gallery, queasy and shuddering. No tourists posing for pictures, no dad, no brother. Just me. And when I looked down at the broad plaza in front of the cathedral, there were no more souvenir hawkers or throngs of schoolkids. Instead men sauntered by in tall black hats, wearing elegant jackets and carrying canes. Women strolled in long skirts, twirling parasols over their shoulders. I blinked and looked again, trying to find the camera crew that must be filming the movie.

  That’s when I noticed that as far as I could see—which was pretty far—there wasn’t a single car, bus, or taxi on the streets. There were horse-drawn carriages, some open, some closed, carts pulled by donkeys, and people walking. And here’s the weirdest thing—there was no Eiffel Tower, like it had been plucked off the landscape.

  I was still in Paris. The question was when?

  I wrote the date but I really had no idea what day or year or century it was. Just from the clothes I was wearing—no jeans or T-shirt, but a dark green dress with a tight waist and high, choky neck—I knew I wasn’t in the twenty-first century, or even the twentieth. No cars, no airplanes, no TV antennas. No Dad or Malcolm either. But I was still holding my sketchbook. That’s the only thing that was the same.

  I touched the gargoyle again, but nothing happened. I touched all the gargoyles in a sweaty panic. No luck. I was still wearing a weird dress, and the Eiffel Tower was still gone. I wish I could say that I was brave and resourceful and figured out exactly what strange supernatural glitch had hurled me back in time. But I wasn’t. I was knee-shaking, stomach-clenching scared.

  “Okay,” I told myself. “You’re alive and not hurt, so stay calm.” I took a deep breath and plunged back down the winding, dark staircase, holding up the annoying skirt to keep from tripping on it until I flung myself out into the glaringly sunny street.

  And bumped right into someone.

  “So sorry,” I babbled. “I couldn’t see.”

  The boy looked about my age, and that made him seem friendly. Even more friendly when he asked, “You are American?”

  “Yes! And you speak English!”

  “Some. The artist I work for likes to practice English and he helps me. His good friend is American and she helps me also. So with them both, I have two helps. Allow me to introduce myself. I am called Claude.”

  Claude was a terrible name for him because he wasn’t cloddish at all. He was lean and muscular, with deep brown eyes, hair so black it had a blue sheen, and a lopsided smile. Maybe it was the cute French accent that went with the cute French face, or the adorable way he said “two helps.” Whatever it was, I felt I could trust him.

  “Nice to meet you, Claude. I’m Mira.” Actually, this much I could say in French, but since he was speaking English, it seemed easier to stick with the language I knew best. “I know this sounds odd, but could you tell me what day it is?”

  “Today is Tuesday.”

  “I mean the dat
e. And the year.” I hoped I didn’t sound crazy.

  “The second of April, 1881,” he said as if I’d simply asked the time.

  Now I really thought I would throw up! What was I doing in 1881? How did I get here?

  “Mademoiselle.” Claude took my elbow, supporting my suddenly jelly-filled legs. “You don’t look well. If you like, I will accompany you to your hotel.”

  I didn’t know where to go or what to do. Did my hotel even exist in 1881? I mumbled the address.

  “Place Sainte-Catherine?” Claude arched an eyebrow. “You are Jewish?”

  Who says that? I wondered. The only time anybody asked me about my religion was when teachers wanted to know why I was absent on Rosh Hashana or Yom Kippur.

  “I do not mean to pry. It is just that only the Jews live there. Nobody else wants to live with the Jews.”

  Wow. I’d heard my grandparents tell stories about anti-Semitism, but it all seemed quaint and far away. I guessed in 1881, it wasn’t so quaint. I considered saying I was a nice Christian girl. But only for a second.

  “Don’t worry about walking me to my hotel. I wouldn’t want you to dirty yourself with my company.” If only he weren’t so cute, I could have sounded snarkier. Instead I just sounded mad.

  He laughed and took my arm. “It is not a problem.”

  “Did I miss something? Aren’t you worried about being with a Jew?”

  “Mademoiselle Mira, I am Jewish. So now it is you who must worry.”

  I felt like a total idiot. “Open mouth, insert foot.”

  “What do you say? I do not understand.”

  “Never mind,” I said. “Some things shouldn’t be translated. Like my stupidity.”

  I thought I would know the way back to the hotel but everything looked so different that I would never have found it without Claude. The narrow streets were crowded with carts, some pushed by men, others pulled by horses. A man selling umbrellas walked by, carrying his stock rolled up in a rug. Another man balanced a wooden board with loaves of bread on his head. Small stores sold wine or cheese or books, with barrels of wares set out before the windows. The streets were a strange mix of grubby dirtiness and smooth polish. Kids in rags jostled women in silks in front of elegant apartments alternating with ramshackle, dingy buildings.

  We found the address but no hotel. Even if it had been there, my room had been reserved in 2012, not 1881. I pushed down the rising panic, but what was I supposed to do now? I didn’t belong here!

  I slumped down on a bench in the square, trying not to cry.

  “I have a maid’s room at the artist’s house. We can ask the monsieur if you can stay with me,” Claude offered. If he thought I was an idiot for forgetting where my hotel really was, he didn’t say. He was too sweet for that.

  It was a long walk all the way to the artsy neighborhood of Montmartre. I almost suggested we take the metro, except of course there wasn’t one in 1881. We turned off the broad tree-lined boulevard onto small streets that grew narrower, more winding, and steep. Now the houses weren’t as grand, and alongside the small shops and homes, there were restaurants with large gardens. We passed vegetable plots, a small vineyard, a yard penning in goats and sheep, even a windmill. It seemed like there was as much farmland as houses, making this part of Paris feel like a country village. It was like I was walking in a painting or some period-piece movie.

  Then I saw her—Mom! I swear it was her, only she was wearing 1881 clothes like everyone else. She had her hair tucked into a hat that looked like a puff pastry on her head and was sitting at a sidewalk café with a man sprouting a giant walrusy moustache. He looked like an unbaked biscuit with seeds for eyes.

  “Mom!” I yelled, running toward her, stumbling on my stupid skirt and pointy-toed shoes. If I’d been wearing jeans and sneakers, I would have caught her. If she’d been a normal mother, she would have caught me. Instead she looked at me. And then she bolted.

  “Mom!” I screeched, louder and shriller. “Where are you going? Why did you leave?”

  But there was no answer. She jumped into a waiting carriage and was gone. Disappearing again, this time right in front of my eyes.

  “What is she doing here? Do you know?” I bellowed at the walrus man.

  “Mira, calm down, please.” Claude took my arm. “What is wrong?”

  “Just tell me,” I glared at Mr. Walrus, shooting all my rage at Mom through my eyes right into his doughy forehead.

  “So sorry, mademoiselle! Sit down, please! Have a glass of water! A little calm, please!” The man was babbling, but he spoke good English.

  “How do you know my mother?”

  “She is a friend, nothing more. We have certain interests in common, that is all.” Mr. Walrus dabbed at his sweaty face with his handkerchief. “She told me that I might see you and I should say how sorry she is not to be with you. And she gave me this. For you.” He thrust out a pale blue envelope.

  “She knew I’d be here?” Which was stranger—that she expected me or that she was in 1881 Paris herself? Had she sent the postcard from this time? How could that be? I remembered the stamp looked old and so did the card, but I hadn’t noticed the postmark. And why leave a letter for me instead of talking to me herself? It all smelled fishy.

  “What exactly are your interests?” I asked, snatching the letter.

  “I sadly cannot inform you of this. That is for your admirable mother.”

  The man stood up, tipped his hat as if we’d had an ordinary polite chat, and waddled away like a demented penguin. I just stood there hating him. And crying like an idiot.

  “Mira, please, explain me what is wrong.”

  There was way too much to tell. So all I said was, “Let’s go to your place.”

  I guess he was trying to distract me because while we walked, Claude kept up a constant chatter. He told me about his work, running errands for the painter, a man who lived alone except for Claude and the housekeeper. He told me about all the important people who came to the studio—writers, journalists, artists. He said a lot of names, and at first I didn’t pay attention to them. I was thinking about Mom and the letter I was too scared to open.

  Then Claude listed names I knew, names everyone knows. Cézanne, Renoir, Gauguin, Mary Cassatt, really famous painters. I started paying attention.

  “Who is this artist you work for?” I asked.

  “Monsieur Degas. He is a genius.”

  Degas? I had a print of one of his paintings, The Dancing Lesson, in my room. Mom had taken me to the big Impressionist exhibit in San Francisco last year. If I knew what was going on, I could be excited about this time-travel thing. But I was too scared and too angry. The only thing that kept me calm was the warmth of Claude’s arm linked in mine.

  Claude opened the door to a small two-story house, leading me into a room full of chairs, a sofa, and, most of all, paintings. Small sculptures of horses and women were scattered on shelves, tables, and chairs, some in clay, others in plaster or bronze. There was something raw about these figures. You could see the marks of fingers pressing into the clay but instead of looking clumsy, the handling gave the pieces an incredible energy, an urgency. One horse looked like it would leap off its base and gallop around the room. A woman in a tub twisted to scrub her back, and I could swear she moved, she seemed so alive.

  All over the walls were pictures that in the future would be in museums. Some I could tell were by Degas, ballet dancers like my poster, women bathing or trying on hats. But a lot of them weren’t. If I’d taken that art history class Mom wanted me to, I’m sure I could have named the artists. The only one I knew for sure was Van Gogh. No one has such thick, globby brushstrokes, such strange greens and yellows as Van Gogh.

  Besides the paintings, Japanese prints were tacked onto the walls, and piles of books teetered on the floor and on shelves. It was a
ll a mess, but the most artistic mess I’d ever seen.

  “Sit.” Claude steered me into a chair next to a small statuette of a rearing horse. “I will ask the housekeeper to make us some tea.”

  The letter was smoldering in my fingers. Even with so much to look at in the room, I couldn’t wait any longer. As soon as Claude left, I tore open the flap and pulled out the single page.

  Dearest Mira,

  If you’re reading this, it’s because you’ve inherited the gift of time travel. And you know that I’m here in nineteenth-century Paris. That’s why I’m not home in Berkeley, but as soon as I can find a way to return, I will.

  I wish I could tell you how to control the gift, but all I can say is that you need a touchstone. The details are different for each of us, so you must discover for yourself how to move between the centuries.

  The rules I can tell you are these:

  No one can know you’re from the future, or you’ll be stuck in whatever time period you’re in.

  You can’t bring anyone or anything back with you.

  People from the same family should not time-travel together since that doubles the chances of changing their descendants’ lives. It’s too dangerous to risk. That’s one reason why I’m telling you all this in a letter and not in person.

  Once we’re both home, we can talk about all this. For now, please know that I love you, Malcolm, and Dad. I would never have left if the reasons weren’t so absolutely urgent. Trust me to find my way back to you as soon as I can.

  Love,

  Mom

  The letter raised more questions than it answered. Why had she traveled to Paris, 1881, in the first place? Why didn’t she tell us she could time-travel, that I might be able to too? What about Malcolm? Dad? Were they here somewhere and I needed to find them? And what was a touchstone? How was I supposed to figure out where one was and how to use it?