Chapter Five


Meg: Okay, time to try out my less-than-three-years of French skills! I have translations for difficult phrases. Easy or short words I will probably not translate. I've changed some mistakes: thanks to everyone who e-mailed me with corrections!

JWJ: French. It's such a stupid language. They did not help us in the war!

Meg: And this is coming from the kid that's quitting Spanish because it has a socialist government.

JWJ: Yes! They should be ashamed of themselves!

Meg: Admit it, you're quitting because you're just not good at Spanish.

JWJ: That is not true! (Tackles Meg)

Meg: Help!


Once we disembarked in Beauvais, Basil and I changed into trousers, shirts, dirty work jackets and caps, transforming us into labourers. The detective bartered his pocket watch to get us a ride from Beauvais to Paris. When the farmer whose cart we had been riding on decided to kick us out halfway, Basil's mood showed no signs of improving from the English Channel crossing.

Neither did mine.

I shook my fist at the retreating wagon. "Vous êtes un stupid... stupid... um, Basil, how do you say 'imbecile' in French?"

Basil tore off the fake moustache he was wearing. "Imbécile, idiot, or ignare."

"Oh," I said, feeling pretty stupid. I spoke a little French, but Basil's fluency in the language put my skills to shame.

Basil picked up the valise, which had been thrown out after us. "So much for French hospitality."

He began to walk down the dusty road in the hot noon sun. I took off my brown cap and wiped my forehead before following.

"That man can't do that to us!" I began as I ran to catch up to him. "You sold him your watch. It was a fair trade!"

"He whispered to his son that he didn't like the looks of us," Basil muttered. "'Je suis certain que ces deux hommes sont fauteurs de troubles.' (I am certain that those two men are troublemakers.) Well, at least the disguises worked."

"What do we do now?" I asked as I gathered my hair back into the cap.

"Hopefully catch a ride to Paris."

He became silent. I yawned. The heat seemed to hang in the air, making me feel lethargic. We walked for some time, passing fields of wheat and rye.

"Why are we going to Paris?" I asked, the first question I had asked pertaining to this case since our fight on the boat.

Basil took out a handkerchief and wiped his face. "Let me tell you about Marcus Colhart. He is a blackmailer for the Seven Plagues." I shot him a glance but he held up his hand. "Let me finish. Colhart has a great many agents that are lent out to him to get his information. When-"

"How long has he been a blackmailer?" I interrupted.

Basil sighed in annoyance. "About twelve years, which was two years before his father disinherited him. Now Colhart is a rather well-to-do man. He lives in a villa in Cannes-"

"Cannes?" I cut him off once again. "Oh, sorry."

"No, what is it?" he asked.

I was rather taken aback by this sudden show of tolerance for my questions. "Oh... where is Cannes?"

"It is on the Mediterranean coast."

"If it's on the Mediterranean, then why are we going to Paris?"

"In five days there will be a ball at the Parisian Opera House for European royalty and nobility. I believe the Duchess of Bachenstrauff will be there, which gives Colhart the perfect opportunity to terminate her."

Basil hesitated, as if waiting for me to ask another question, but I was too absorbed in thinking about Colhart's connection to the Seven Plagues. He then continued, "I've read the newspapers. Landon Colhart is apparently still alive. His one manservant was found to have 'committed suicide' after he threw himself off a train traveling to London the night I was supposed to meet Raleigh."

After a slight pause, I asked, "Did the servant leave a suicide note?"

"Yes. Forged, most likely."

"So Colhart is posing as his brother?"

"It would give him the perfect opportunity to get near to the Duchess. If his sister dies but Landon is still alive, then Landon gets her share of the inheritance. Remember, there is a warrant out for Marcus's arrest due to Landon informing the police of his blackmail activities."

"How will you know where Colhart is?"

"He must be at the family manor outside of Paris, where Landon had been living."

"So what's the plan?"

A small smile revealed itself on Basil's lips. "Dawson is never this straightforward. I can't decide whether it is your differences in age, gender, or personality."

"Oh." I could not decide whether he saw straightforwardness as a good or bad thing.

Basil his face towards mine and appeared to study it for a few moments. "What's wrong?" he asked.

"What? What makes you think that something's wrong?"

"I've been around you long enough to know that when something is bothering you. You become unusually quiet."

"I do?"

"Yes."

"Oh," was all I could say.

Basil shook his head, still smiling. "All right Meg, you can be quiet if you want to be."

"So Colhart's involved with Ratigan?" I blurted out.

Basil's features changed into a frown. "Unfortunately yes. But that doesn't mean that Ratigan is involved in this case."

"Oh." We stepped into the shade of some trees. "So what's the plan again?"

"We will go to Paris, find this manor, find evidence against Colhart, and turn him in before he can lay a hand on his sister. But first we need to find Rahle."

I stared long and hard at him. "'We?'"

Basil stared straight ahead, ignoring my gaze. "It's about time you were more involved in my cases. It's much easier to keep track of you when you're not working against me," he said, slowly smiling.

"I've never worked against you!"

Basil laughed. "Never? You've run off with valuable evidence, you didn't tell me when you were sent threatening notes, you snuck off to private kung fu lessons without telling anyone of your whereabouts, and you completely disregarded my orders to not follow Matthew Childres' men when they kidnapped the Flavershams. I can safely say that you're working against me."

"By not cooperating? But it's so much more fun that way!" I said, laughing.

He shook his head in mock disbelief. "You are going to be the death of me someday."

I looked behind us. "Hey, there's a wagon!" I exclaimed. « Messieurs! Vous pouvez nous emmener? » (Give us a ride?)

"Wait until they get closer, Meg," Basil said.

I laughed again, feeling light-hearted and free. It was strange. Basil and I were fugitives in a foreign land. Ratigan wanted him dead and me for his own selfish reasons. Colhart wanted us dead. We had no food, hardly any money and definitely no idea what our futures held. But I was happy, and all because Basil had finally been nice to me.

« Messieurs! Est-ce que je peux vous déposer quelque part? » (Can I give you a lift?) One mouse called from the wagon.

« Oui! Allez-vous à Paris? Basil called out. » (Yes! Are you going to Paris?)

« Oui! »

« Merci beaucoup! »

As we got on the wagon, Basil whispered to me, "Who says that I don't want you around, ma chère?"

My face turned red. He had been awake on the train!


We walked the slums of Paris, passing little children playing in the gutters as matronly women hung laundry on lines between the houses. Despite our disguises, I had the feeling that every mouse knew we were foreigners. I stayed close to Basil as he led me through the narrow streets.

We turned off into an alley and entered a small wine shop. Casks of wine lined the walls, while a few tables and chairs were positioned beneath them. An older woman stood at the counter, deep in conversation with another middle-aged woman behind the counter. Two more patrons entered the shop behind us.

« Rahle? » Basil asked the woman at the counter.

« Oui. En haut, » (Upstairs) she answered, motioning to a hallway behind her.

« Merci. »

I followed obediently behind him as we went through the narrow hallway, then up two flights of stairs to a single door on the small landing.

Basil knocked on the door. « Allez-vous-en! » (Go away!) a rough male voice yelled in French. « Je suis occupé. » (I am busy.)

Basil tapped his foot impatiently. "You haven't been working all day. I know for a fact that you're lying on a couch smoking a cigar and reading a dime novel."

I heard a thump as something heavy hit the floor, followed by a pair of slow, labored footsteps. These were followed by the sounds of door locks being unbolted and unchained. The door opened a crack and a short mouse with graying fur appeared before us.

"Monsieur Basil!" he cried in a heavy French accent. He pressed the hand that held the cigar to his chest, ash scraping across his blue shirt. "I swear that you are a magician. How did you know all that I was doing?"

Basil took off his disguise. "You know my methods," he said, shouldering his way past the mouse.

I began to follow when the mouse stopped me. "Who is this? No, I take no strangers into my confidence."

I raised my eyebrow at the strange usage of the word. "He's confiding something to us?" I asked Basil. "I thought he was giving us some more disguises."

"Go away, you silly boy!" the strange little mouse snapped at me. Then he turned to Basil. "Monsieur, you want more disguises? Oh, I have just the thing you are looking for!" And he rushed inside.

I pushed the door completely open. My eyes met a flat crowded with crates and chests, wigs, paints, and jars with strange objects with them. I had to climb over a pram and two boxes to get to Basil and the little mouse by the window. The flat was stifling hot.

"Can we open the door?" I asked.

"No!" the little mouse barked at me.

Basil rolled his eyes. "Just ignore him Meg."

"What is it that you are looking for?" the mouse asked eagerly. Basil had just opened his mouth to answer when the little mouse interrupted, "Wait! This just came in yesterday!" He dove into a group of crates and began to rummage through them. "Now where is it? Zut!" the mouse swore in French. I gave Basil a bewildered look.

He shrugged. "Rahle is completely unorthodox, which is what makes him such a master at his trade."

"Like you, I suppose," I smiled, taking off my disguise.

"Ah! Here is it!" Rahle exclaimed, shoving a black housemaid's dress into his arms. "No one will be able to recognize you in it!"

The thought of Basil as a housemaid was so ridiculous that I burst out laughing.

Rahle glared at me. Then he gasped. « Une femme! »

"You couldn't even recognize that she was a woman?" Basil said to him as he handed the dress back to the French mouse. "Rahle, one would say that you were losing your touch."

"But that is why I am such a skilled artist!" Rahle said defensively. "Even I don't recognize the subjects of my work!"

Basil and I raised our eyebrows at this comment. "What are you talking about? She was never one of your 'subjects.'"

"She wasn't? Oh, never mind then." Rahle threw himself into another set of boxes. "Here!" He thrust a kimono at Basil. "Real silk. Three hundred francs at least!"

"Rahle, I'm looking for something specific," Basil said. "Where's that mask I asked you to make for me a few months ago?"

"I almost forgot!" Rahle exclaimed. He shoved aside a couple of boxes that were blocking a door that had three locks on it. Taking out a large set of keys, the French mouse rapidly unlocked each lock. "Follow me!"

There was a flight of stairs leading up to a small attic. It was cooler up here, mainly because there were two wide windows that were letting the air in. There were strange masks in this room, ranging from deformed faces to one of the Queen of England. I stared in amazement at the likeness. "Good thing Ratigan doesn't know about you," I said to Rahle.

"What are you talking about, silly girl! Everyone knows about me!"

"What?" I gave Basil an alarmed look.

Basil folded his arms as Rahle went to the largest safe I had ever seen in my life and began to turn the dial. "Rahle is the best of the best."

"Oh course I am!" Rahle said.

Basil rolled his eyes. "He doesn't care who his clients are, as long as he gets money."

"Ratigan's his CLIENT?"

"One of them," Basil said languidly.

Someone could have pushed me over with a feather. Rahle stamped his foot and swore at the safe because he had forgotten the combination. Basil's eyes were fixed on a sheet-covered lump on a dye-stained wooden table in the corner.

"But what if Ratigan finds out? Can't Rahle get arrested for this? Aren't you concerned for-"

"Meg, calm down. As far as I know, Ratigan is well aware of the fact that I'm one of Rahle's clients. As for getting arrested, I haven't cared to tell the Parisian police because I would lose his skills. That is precisely why Ratigan doesn't care to attack or threaten Rahle for his skills either, because he knows that he is so stubborn that he wouldn't work if he was threatened." Basil edged towards the dye-stained table. He gingerly picked up one corner of the sheet.

"Non! Get away from there, Monsieur Basil!" Rahle slammed his hand down on the cloth. "That is top secret!"

"All right!" Basil said, holding up his hands in defense.

Rahle went back to the safe. I picked up a jar filled with jeweled rings and began to examine it. There was a click as Rahle opened the safe. He pulled out a sheet-covered bundle and placed it on the table.

"Voilà! My masterpiece!" he cried, whipping off the sheet.

I dropped the jar of rings in surprise.

« Petite idiote! » Rahle shrieked as he dove to gather up the rings.

Basil looked up at the ceiling as he pushed over a clay bowl filled with glass eyeballs. They rolled across the floor. "Really Meg, you are unbelievably clumsy today."

I glared at him while Rahle started to scream at me in rapid French. "Sorry! I mean, desole, wait, je suis desolée!" I yelled back as I got on my knees to help him.

As we were busy retrieving eyeballs I saw Basil lift up the sheet on the table and take a good look at Rahle's "top secret" project. I smiled to myself. I had a feeling that whatever was under there was something Rahle was making for Ratigan.

Rahle stood up, red in the face. Words like « petite imbecile » (little imbecile), « les femmes » (women), and « mon travail » (my work) I was able to pick up, but the rest was unintelligible to me.

"I don't like strange persons coming in here and messing up all of my work!"

I ignored him, peering at the object that had shocked me. It was a mask that looked exactly like Basil. "My God," I breathed, slowly extending out a finger to touch it.

"No!" Rahle grabbed me by the shirt and violently pulled me away from the table. "You must never, ever touch it, you accursed girl!"

"You're rude!" I shouted back at him.

Basil started to laugh. We both glared at him. "What's so funny?" we asked in unison.

"Rahle," he said in mid-laugh, "she's going to be wearing that mask!"


Sarah: I like Rahle. He's strange in a funny way.

(Meg and JWJ are trying to beat each other up.)

Meg: Stop pulling my hair!

JWJ: Let go of my ear!

RAEB: We really need to separate those two.