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Marc Girondin had worked in the filing section of the city hall'sengineering department for so long that the city was laid out inhis mind like a map, full of names and places, intersecting streetsand streets that led nowhere, blind alleys and winding lanes.

In all Montreal no one possessed such knowledge; a dozen policemenand taxi drivers together could not rival him. That is not to saythat he actually knew the streets whose names he could recite likea series of incantations, for he did little walking. He knew simplyof their existence, where they were, and in what relation theystood to others.

But it was enough to make him a specialist. He was undisputedexpert of the filing cabinets where all the particulars of all thestreets from Abbott to Zotique were indexed, back, forward andacross. Those aristocrats, the engineers, the inspectors of watermains and the like, all came to him when they wanted some littleparticular, some detail, in a hurry They might despise him as alowly clerk, but they needed him all the same.

Marc much preferred his office, despite the profound lack ofexcitement of his work, to his room on Oven Street (running northand south from Sherbrooke East to St. Catherine), where hisneighbors were noisy and sometimes violent, and his landladyconsistently so. He tried to explain the meaning of his existenceonce to a fellow tenant, Louis, but without much success. Louis,when he got the drift, was apt to sneer.

"So Craig latches on to Bleury and Bleury gets to be Park, so whocares? Why the excitement?"

"I will show you," said Marc. "Tell me, first, where you live."

"Are you crazy? Here on Oven Street. Where else?"

"How do you know?"

"How do I know? I'm here, ain't I? I pay my rent, don't I? I get mymail here, don't I?"

Marc shook his head patiently.

"None of that is evidence," he said. "You live here on Oven Streetbecause it says so in my filing cabinet at city hall. The postoffice sends you mail because my card index tells it to. If mycards didn't say so, you wouldn't exist and Oven Street wouldn'teither. That, my friend, is the triumph of bureaucracy."

Louis walked away in disgust. "Try telling that to the landlady,"he muttered.

So Marc continued on his undistinguished career, his fortiethbirthday came and went without remark, day after day passeduneventfully. A street was renamed, another constructed, a thirdwidened; it all went carefully into the files, back, forward andacross.

And then something happened that filled him with amazement, shockedhim beyond measure, and made the world of the filing cabinetstremble to their steel bases.

One August afternoon, opening a drawer to its fullest extent, hefelt something catch. Exploring farther, he discovered a card stuckat the back between the top and bottom. He drew it out and found itto be an old index card, dirty and torn, but still perfectlydecipherable. It was labeled RUE DE LA BOUTEILLE VERTE, or GREENBOTTLE STREET.

Marc stared at it in wonder. He had never heard of the place or ofanything resembling so odd a name. Undoubtedly it had been retitledin some other fashion befitting the modern tendency. He checked thelisted details and ruffled confidently through the master file ofstreet names. It was not there. He made another search, careful andprotracted, through the cabinets. There was nothing. Absolutelynothing.

Once more he examined the card. There was no mistake. The date ofthe last regular street inspection was exactly fifteen years, fivemonths and fourteen days ago.

As the awful truth burst upon him, Marc dropped the card in horror,then pounced on it again fearfully, glancing over his shoulder ashe did so.

It was a lost, a forgotten street. For fifteen years and more ithad existed in the heart of Montreal, not half a mile from cityhall, and no one had known. It had simply dropped out of sight, astone in water.

In his heart, Marc had sometimes dreamed of such a possibility.There were so many obscure places, twisting lanes and streetsjumbled together as intricately as an Egyptian labyrinth. But ofcourse it could not happen, not with the omniscient file at hand.Only it had. And it was dynamite. It would blow the officesky-high.

Vaguely, in his consternation, Marc remembered how, some time afterhe first started to work, his section had been moved to anotherfloor. The old-fashioned files were discarded and all the cardsmade out afresh. It must have been at that time that Green BottleStreet was stuck between the upper and lower drawers.

He put the card in his pocket and went home to reflect. That nighthe slept badly and monstrous figures flitted through his dreams.Among them appeared a gigantic likeness of his chief going mad andforcing him into a red-hot filing cabinet.

The next day he made up his mind. Pleading illness, he took theafternoon off and with beating heart went looking for the street.

Although he knew the location perfectly, he passed it twice and hadto retrace his steps. Baffled, he closed his eyes, consulted hismind's infallible map and walked directly to the entry. It was sonarrow that he could touch the adjoining walls with hisoutstretched hands. A few feet from the sidewalk was a tall andsolid wooden structure, much weather-beaten, with a simple latcheddoor in the center. This he opened and stepped inside. Green BottleStreet lay before him.

It was perfectly real, and reassuring as well. On either side of acobbled pavement were three small houses, six in all, each with adiminutive garden in front, spaced off by low iron palings of akind that has disappeared except in the oldest quarters. The houseslooked extremely neat and well kept and the cobbles appeared tohave been recently watered and swept. Windowless brick walls ofancient warehouses encircled the six homes and joined at thefarther end of the street.

At his first glance, Marc realized how it had gotten its unusualname. It was exactly like a bottle in shape.

With the sun shining on the stones and garden plots, and the bluesky overhead, the street gave him a momentary sense of well-beingand peace. It was completely charming, a scene from a print offifty years ago.

A woman who Marc guessed was some sixty years of age was wateringroses in the garden of the first house to his right. She gazed athim motionless, and the water flowed from her can unheeded to theground. He took off his hat and announced, "I'm from the cityengineering department, madam."

The woman recovered herself and set her watering can down.

"So you have found out at last," she said.

At these words, Marc's reborn belief that after all he had made aharmless and ridiculous error fled precipitately. There was nomistake.

"Tell me, please," he said tonelessly.

It was a curious story. For several years, she said, the tenants ofGreen Bottle Street had lived in amity with each other and thelandlord, who also resided in one of the little houses. The ownerbecame so attached to them that in a gesture of goodwill he deededthem his property, together with a small sum of money, when hedied.

"We paid our taxes," the woman said, "and made out a multitude offorms and answered the questions of various officials at regularintervals about our property. Then, after a while, we were sent nonotices, so we paid no more taxes. No one bothered us at all. Itwas a long time before we understood that in some way they'dforgotten about us."

Marc nodded. Of course, if Green Bottle Street had dropped from theken of city hall, no inspectors would go there, no census takers,no tax collectors. All would pass merrily by, directed elsewhere bythe infallible filing cabinet.

"Then Michael Flanagan, who lives at number four," she went on, "amost interesting man, you must meet him--Mr. Flanagan called ustogether and said that if miracles happened, we should aid and abetthem. It was he who had the door built and put up at the entranceto keep out passersby or officials who might come along. We used tokeep it locked, but it's been so long since anyone came that wedon't bother now.

"Oh, there were many little things we had to do, like getting ourmail at the post office and never having anything delivered at thedoor. Now almost the only visits we make to the outside world areto buy our food and clothes."

"And there has never been any change here all that time?" Marcasked.

"Yes, two of our friends died, and their rooms were empty for awhile. Then Jean Desselin--he's in number six and sometimes goesinto the city--returned with a Mr. Plonsky, a refugee. Mr. Plonskywas very tired and worn out with his travelings and gladly moved inwith us. Miss Hunter, in number three, brought home a very niceperson--a distant relative, I believe. They quite understand thesituation."

"And you, madam?" Marc inquired.

"My name is Sara Trusdale, and I have lived here for more thantwenty years. I hope to end my days here as well."

She smiled pleasantly at him, apparently forgetting for the momentthat he carried in his pocket a grenade that could blow theirlittle world to pieces.

All of them, it seemed, had had their troubles, their losses andfailures, before they found themselves in this place of refuge,this Green Bottle Street. To Marc, conscious of his ownunsatisfactory existence, it sounded entrancing. He fingered thecard in his pocket uncertainly. "Mr. Plonsky and Mr. Flanagan took a great liking to each other,"Miss Trusdale continued. "Both of them have been travelers and theylike to talk about the things they have seen. Miss Hunter plays thepiano and gives us concerts. Then there's Mr. Hazard and Mr.Desselin, who are very fond of chess and who brew wine in thecellar. For myself, I have my flowers and my books. It has beenvery enjoyable for all of us."

Marc and Miss Trusdale sat on her front step for a long time insilence. The sky's blue darkened, the sun disappeared behind thewarehouse wall on the left.

"You remind me of my nephew," Miss Trusdale said suddenly. "He wasa dear boy. I was heartbroken when he died in the influenzaepidemic after the war. I'm the last of my family, you know."

Marc could not recall when he had been spoken to with such simple,if indirect, goodwill. His heart warmed to this old lady. Obscurelyhe felt on the verge of a great moral discovery. He took the cardout of his pocket.

"I found this yesterday in the filing cabinet," he said. "No oneelse knows about it yet. If it should come out, there would be agreat scandal, and no end of trouble for all of you as well.Newspaper reporters, tax collectors . . ."

He thought again of his landlady, his belligerent neighbors, hisroom that defied improvement. "I wonder," he said slowly, "I am a good tenant, and I wonder . .."

"Oh yes," she leaned forward eagerly, "you could have the top floorof my house. I have more space than I know what to do with. I'msure it would suit you. You must come and see it right away."

The mind of Marc Girondin, filing clerk, was made up. With agesture of renunciation he tore the card across and dropped thepieces in the watering can. As far as he was concerned, GreenBottle Street would remain mislaid forever.