It was a beautiful morning. The water was calm and glasslike. There was a softness to the light at this time of year, a certain pink smudginess that Marty liked.

At seven thirty exactly, Grandad fired up the engine and Marty untied the rope. He jumped back into the pumpkin and pushed away from the harbor wall with the broom handle they’d brought with them.

They found the mouth of the Seine easily as the Normandy bridge humped above it. Marty looked up in awe as they sailed under it, and the wonders kept coming after that. There were bridges and grand houses, and they dodged ferries and pleasure boaters, each one honking their horns at them in glee. They passed villages and towns whose names Grandad shouted out as they went.

“Caudebec! Rouen! Les Andelys! Giverny! That’s where Monet’s garden is, you know, Marty! Vernon!”

Marty was struck by their beauty. He and Gracie waved as shoals of cycling children rode past on their way to school. And fishermen shouted out greetings in the morning air. Marty kept his hand on the sail, keeping the pumpkin in between the riverbanks and trying not to get too near the edges. Gracie stood guard, because since the pumpkin wasn’t particularly maneuverable, you had to have plenty of warning to get out of the way of things. She sat in the front of the pumpkin, keeping watch and shouting out instructions that Marty and Grandad followed.

As they got nearer to Paris, the waterways were busier with tourists and day boats. Marty looked on in wonder as the riverbanks began to fill up. With cafés and little stands selling comics and old books. There were artists too, selling their pictures or selling caricatures to people walking by. And then the city began to come into view.

It was midmorning by now, and the morning mists had already been burned off the river by the warm autumnal sun, but Marty couldn’t help but think that there was something of a mirage about what he saw. It was a dreamscape almost, rising slowly above them.

“Look!” shouted Gracie. “It’s the Arc de Triomphe!”

The river was snaking now, folding back on itself. Showing the city and hiding it at the same time. They rounded another corner, and then Marty dropped his compass. It slipped off his knees and to the floor as he stood up, his mouth agape. Grandad called over to him.

“You all right, Marty?!”

Marty nodded silently.

“There it is,” he whispered reverently, “the Eiffel Tower.”

And there it was. Glinting in the morning light. Ancient and brand-new at the same time. Its beautiful curved lines. Its strength. Gracie looked back at Marty and smiled.