Now he was being towed downstream, and his feet rose to the surface, trailing behind him. He reached up and got hold of a large cleat, from which the tire was suspended, and hoisted himself high enough to get a foot inside the tire. With his last strength he used the tire as his ladder and pulled himself onto the narrow deck. Then he knew nothing.
—
NEXT, he heard a woman’s voice. “Pierre!” she was shouting, over and over. “Pierre, venez!” Stone stared up into an upside-down face, then he passed out again.
When he woke for the second time, he was warm. He was under a heavy blanket—no, several blankets—in a small cabin. He sat up and looked around. There was a little chest of drawers built into one wall, and there were framed pictures resting on it, family photographs. He stood up and found that he was naked, and he wrapped one of the blankets around himself. He peeked out the door and saw a hallway leading aft to what seemed to be a saloon. “Hello!” he called out. “Bon soir!” No reply. His words had been lost in the sound of the barge’s rumbling engine. He staggered down the hallway and emerged into the nautical version of a family living room. A woman stood with her back to him, bent over an ironing board. On a table behind her was a little pile of things that had once been in his pockets—a credit card case, euros held by a large gold paper clip, a comb, and his iPhone.
“Pardon!” he shouted, and she turned around. She was perhaps fifty, with a weathered but handsome face, dressed in a flannel shirt and jeans. “Mon Dieu!” she said.
“No,” Stone said, “just an American. Parlez-vous Anglais?”
“Oui,” she said. “Ah, yes, pretty good. You would like some soup?”
“Merci, yes, please.”
She went to the galley and returned with a large mug containing a dark, steaming liquid: onion soup, as it turned out.
He sipped some. “Wunderbar,” he sighed, and she laughed.
“You are Deutsch? Ah, German?”
“No, just a poor linguist.”
She laughed again.
“Who is Pierre? I heard you calling to him.”
“My husband. He is in the wheelhouse.”
“Where are we?”
“Half the time to the Channel Anglais. Where have you come from?”
He thought about that. He couldn’t think of the name of the bridge. “A bridge,” he said.
“Are you, ah, suicide?”
Stone laughed. “No, but some people were trying to help me in that direction.”
“Why?”
“It’s a long story,” he said.
She shrugged. “Not my business,” she said. “You were very lucky to get on our barge. You did not seem wounded, so we did not call for the ambulance.”
“I certainly was very lucky.” The soup was cooling, and he drank some more. “You make very good soup.”
“Thank you. When you have drink it all, you may get into your clothes. I am having dried them.”
He looked behind her and saw his shirt and underwear, ironed and neatly stacked. “Thank you so much,” he said. His suit hung on a hanger, and his trench coat on a peg.
“Your coat takes a little longer, but you can get dressed.” She turned her back and resumed ironing something.