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“A young man was traveling to take a very important exam to become a minister. On the way, he gets sick in a mountain village. So this mountain doctor takes care of him, and while he’s recovering, he meets the doctor’s daughter, and they fall in love. Right before he leaves, the girl tells him a line of verse. The boy heads off to the capital to take his exam and does well, and the emperor’s all impressed. So, I guess to test him further, he says a line of verse. Of course, the boy immediately recognizes this mysterious line as the other half of the couplet the girl told him, so he repeats what the girl said. The emperor’s doubly impressed, and the boy gets the job. Then he goes back and marries the girl. So, double happiness, I guess. He gets the job and the girl. You know, the Chinese are very big on luck.”
Willem shakes his head. “I think the double happiness is the two halves finding each other. Like the couplet.”
I’d never thought of it, but of course that’s what it is.
“Do you remember how it goes?” Willem asks.
I nod. “Green trees against the sky in the spring rain while the sky set off the spring trees in the obscuration. Red flowers dot the land in the breeze’s chase while the land colored up in red after the kiss.”
The final section of the canal is underground. The walls are arched, and so low that I can reach up and touch the slick, wet bricks. It’s eerie, hushed but echoey down here. Even the boisterous Danes have shushed. Willem and I sit with our legs dangling over the edge of the boat, kicking the side of the tunnel wall when we can.
He nudges my ankle with his toe. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For arranging this.” He gestures to the boat.
“My pleasure. Thank you for arranging this.” I point above us, to where Paris is no doubt going about its business.
“Any time.” He looks around. “It’s nice, this. The canal.” He looks at me. “You.”
“I’ll bet you say that to all the canals.” But I flush in the musty, rich darkness.
We stay like that for the rest of the ride, swinging our legs against the side of the boat, listening as the odd bit of laughter or music from Paris seeps underground. It feels like the city is telling secrets down here, privy only to those who think to listen.
Eight
Arsenal Marina is like a parking lot for boats, tightly packed into cement piers on both sides of the water. Willem helps Captain Jack guide the barge into its narrow mooring, hopping out to tie the lines in complicated knots. We bid farewell to the Danes, who are now truly soused, and I take down Agnethe’s cell phone number, promising to text her the pictures as soon as I can.
As we get off, Captain Jack shakes our hands. “I feel a little bad to take your money,” he says.
“No. Don’t feel bad.” I think of the look on Willem’s face, of being in the tunnel. That alone was worth a hundred bucks.
“And we’ll take it off you soon enough,” Gustav calls.
Jacques shrugs. He kisses my hand before he helps me off the boat, and he practically hugs Willem.
As we walk away, Willem taps my shoulder. “Did you see what the boat is named?”
I didn’t. It’s right on the back, etched in blue lettering, next to the vertical red, white, and blue stripes of the French flag. Viola. Deauville.
“Viola? After Shakespeare’s Viola?”
“No. Jacques meant for it be called Voilà, but his cousin painted it wrong, and he liked the name, so he registered her as Viola.”
“Okaaay—that’s still a little weird,” I say.
As always, Willem smiles.
“Accidents?” Immediately, a strange little tremor goes up my spine.
Willem nods, almost solemnly. “Accidents,” he confirms.
“But what does it mean? Does it mean we were meant to take that boat? Does it mean something better or worse would’ve happened to us if we hadn’t taken that boat? Did taking that boat alter the course of our lives? Is life really that random?”
Willem just shrugs.
“Or does it mean that Jacques’s cousin can’t spell?” I say.
