The Ruby
The ruby was lying on a cushion in a corner of the room. Numerous pieces of art were piled in a clumsy way, despite the instructions of great care. People in gray or blue overalls were walking in and out of the room. One of them suddenly hit the ruby by accident. The jewel was saved from a dangerous fall by another workman who caught it just before it hit the floor.
“Fais attention avec ça!” he said angrily to his colleague.
“What?” the other answered.
“Ah c’est toi le type du musée américain?”
“America, yes, I’m from there. Can’t you speak English?”
“The ruby is very frageel,” he said with a strong French accent. “You ‘ave to be carefool.”
“Oh yeah, right…” The American said in an annoyed voice.
The French worker grumbled some more and walked away with the ruby. He placed it on a cotton sheet, carefully wrapping it. While he worked, he kept whispering to himself and shaking his head, shocked by the total lack of care of his American colleague. The ruby, though huge and with an appearance of solidity, was very fragile. With the shape of a rose, it was a unique artistic item carved by a famous French artist.
The worker then took a long sheet of craft paper and tightly enveloped the ruby with it. After that, the gem was wrapped once more, this time in plastic. Then finally, it was placed in a cartoon box, which was fast closed and secured with duct tape.
Workers spent all day loading the precious collections into trucks. The storage room—which was actually a huge garage—was emptying slowly. The art was mainly French, leaving Paris to go either to America or Asia. After exhibitions here and there, all of the pictures, sculptures, and of course the ruby would come back to France.
It was the ruby’s first expedition. The brand new jewel had been presented just a month earlier to French audiences, and it was now ready for the world. But it wasn’t traveling alone. With it were mainly pictures, enclosed in thin but large boxes. Those were piled on top of the heavier boxes, so that they wouldn’t risk being broken or folded. A few sculptures were also part of the trip. Thankfully, none was of a large size. Thus, although they were all made of stone or marble, they were quite light. The most precious of them was the ruby. Workers didn’t know if they had to qualify it as sculpture or jewel, but they all agreed that its flower shape was incredibly beautiful.
The American worker had made his way to Europe especially to look after the ruby, although he did it in a peculiar manner. He didn’t actually care much about art at all. His job was to load and unload boxes of all sorts in trucks of all sorts. Why the museum had sent him was a mystery to everyone. Yet, there he was, getting yelled at in French for his lack of care. He acted as if he didn’t understand, which wasn’t entirely a lie, and kept doing his job.
When the truck was fully loaded with all the precious items, the driver climbed behind his wheel and started the engine. The American sat next to him. He would have preferred to go straight to the airport and back to the USA, but he had to follow the same road as the ruby. They left Paris early in the afternoon and traveled north to Calais. As the American didn’t speak French and the driver didn’t speak English, there obviously wasn’t much talking between them. A monotonous silence was prevented by the music playing out on the radio. That music was commercial and boring, but at least it kept the driver awake.
Towns and cities appeared and disappeared, being hardly even noticed by the occupants of the truck. One was focused on the road, the other kept looking at his watch. The ruby had to be delivered at a precise time on a precise day. His boss would make his life a hell if there were to be any delay. But because the ruby was in the same truck as a number of items going to London, it had to make a little detour. And thus,
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