The Paris sun was quickly replaced by halogen street lights. The nightlife began, but now people moved more quickly and in groups. Voices were harsher.

Ayamin held onto my arm as we walked down the street, ‘I’ve never felt as safe sleeping in the cities.’

I nodded, ‘There’s something about people after dark.’

We stopped walking, one of the side streets in front of us, no more than 200 meters from the Notre Dame was packed with white and blue tarpaulins.

Children played football in the street, a group of women sat in front of a steaming pot of rice and the men talked with their backs against the walls of the street.

A football bounced towards us. I stuck my leg out, stopped the ball and held it under my foot. A crowd of kids came rushing towards me, stopping only a meter or two in front of us. Some of them had bare feet.

One of the older boys held out his hands. His teeth shone under the streetlights.

I rolled the ball out and hackyed it four times before passing it to him. He grinned. Did five, then passed it back to me. Ayamin was groaning, ‘You’ll embarrass yourself Danny.’

I kept going anyway. Lifting the ball with my foot, and tapping it with my feet a couple of times before bringing it to my head then back down to make six.

The kids around us yelled and a little boy with two missing front teeth high fived me.

The older boy did seven keepy uppys. I barely managed eight. He rolled the ball onto his bare foot and made a start, reaching seven before the ball appeared to go out of his control, he stumbled for it and got his eighth, all the kids around us gasped but he lept for the ball and managed nine. I wiped my forehead…

With an easy grin on his face he continued to twenty, then thirty, then forty hackies. The boys in our circle began to crack up laughing and that’s when I realised it had never been a contest. We slapped hands. The little kid with no teeth cheered.

Ayamin crouched in front of them, ‘Does anyone here speak Arabic?’

The boy I’d been playing against nodded, and so did his little toothless brother.

‘What is happening here with all these people in the street?’ Ayamin asked.

‘We’re camping,’ said the little boy.

The footballer shrugged, ‘It’s a tent village,’ he tilted his head to the side and eyed the pack on Ayamin’s back, ‘Anyone is allowed to stay.’

The pair led us to a canvas tent where their father sat reading a mud-smeared National Geographic magazine under the light of the streetlamp.

‘Hello brother, hello sister,’ he said in a rich, deep voice, ‘You’ve come to stay in the most cultured tent city in the world?’

I glanced at Ayamin, wondering if I should ask about getting to England, but the man seemed to take my look for confusion.

‘The world’s greatest works of art sit not far from our humble tents,’ he said, ‘Great plays are performed every night two streets over, and if you’re quiet enough you can hear the musicians of tomorrow performing on the other side of this very building.’

He smiled, a dreamy book-like smile, ‘But something tells me you won’t be staying on our street for very long.’

‘We want to get to England,’ Ayamin said.

‘Are you rich?’

Ayamin shook her head, ‘We wouldn’t be here if we were.’

He sighed, ‘Then I’d say to you, try and claim refugee status in France.’

‘But there is a way?’

The man stared at her, there was silence, he almost seemed to be daring her to walk away. After half a minute his eyes dropped, ‘The body snatchers charge the least.’

‘The body snatchers?’

‘Sometimes the people who go in those vans just disappear.’

Ayamin nodded, ‘I’ve heard stories… How do we find them?’

‘You don’t, you have to gather all the money you can, then wait for them to show up.’

I looked over at Ayamin, then tapped my pocket. She nodded. We both knew we were broke.

‘I don’t suppose anyone goes as low as fifty euro?’ I asked.

The man laughed, ‘More like five hundred brother, and that’s each. Fifty would barely get you a taxi.’

Ayamin looked at me and grimaced, we both knew what we’d have to do, but it wouldn’t be pleasant.

‘I guess we could sell Henry,’ I said.

Ayamin nodded slowly, ‘Poor little Henry.’

‘Let’s just keep it quiet around him,’ I said, ‘He won’t take it well.’

The man shook our hands. His name was Yamiz. Yamiz the dentist.