Free Resistance by Anita Shreve Page A

audacity of his plan, and by the proximity of his own house, not twenty meters away, Jean moved quickly. He reached for the American's arm, tugged him slightly toward him. He took the arm, ran the large hand along the edge of the trough so that the American could feel the shape and perhaps understand the plan. The flyer seemed to, inched himself forward, rolled, hooked his good leg over the side of the trough. Holding the man as best he could, Jean helped guide him out of the barrow and into the trough. When the American finally fell inside it, the thud seemed to Jean the loudest sound he had ever heard.
    Earlier in the day, Jean had emptied the trough of potatoes. He knew he would again have to fill the trough with potatoes to cover the American. He reached for the flyer's hand again, made him touch a potato, but he didn't know if the man had any feeling in his hands. He placed a potato near the American's face, on the off chance the man might be able to smell it. But there was no more time for explanations.
    Carefully, Jean placed potatoes in the trough, positioning them as gently as he could around the pilot's face and legs. The man made no sound, no protest. Knowing the gaps between the potatoes would allow the man to breathe, and hoping to provide some protection from the cold, the boy filled the trough to its top, hid the sack with the remaining potatoes underneath a pile of hay. He moved toward the door, anxious to be gone from the barn, but hesitated at its threshhold.
    Making his way back to the trough, he bent low over the spot where the pilot's head was. Jean's lips brushed the skin of a potato.
    Return
, he said in English.
    His father hit him such a blow he spun, knocked a chair on its back. His world, a shrinking world inside the kitchen, went momentarily black, then spotty with bright lights. His upper lip was split over his teeth, and when he put his hand to his mouth, his fingers came away with blood. He didn't dare to move or speak. He couldn't be exactly sure what the blow was for, and he knew it was always best to wait, to keep silent. Nothing enraged his father more than a protest or a challenge.
    “Monsieur Dauvin's been here. Says you weren't at school. Not from noon on,” his father yelled from the sink. Artaud Benoît picked up his lit cigarette from the table, took a quick drag, held it between his thumb and forefinger. How had his father known he would come through the door at that precise moment? Jean wondered. He'd have been waiting, and in the waiting he would have become drunk. Even from across the room, Jean could smell the beer. There were unwashed bottles under the table.
    “You weren't at that plane, I’m hoping. No son of mine.”
    No son of mine, Jean thought. He put a hand oh the tabletop to steady himself. His legs felt weak. He, desperately did not want to fall. The oilcloth on the table was worn, threadbare in places from his mother's scrubbing. A single bulb hung from the ceiling, illuminating the room, casting harsh shadows on the wallpaper, the stove, the marble mantel with the crucifix and the bottle of holy water. The boy's dinner, which his mother had put out for him, lay congealed on a plate on the table. The thought of his mother, who would have gone up to the bedroom, made his chest tight.
    “And your mother, lying to the teacher for your sake, telling him you'd come home sick. Weeping afterwards, not knowing where you'd got to.”
    Jean stood as still as he could, despising his father for the show of false sympathy for his mother. He kept his breathing deliberate and measured. He dropped his eyes to the stone floor, a floor his mother swept and washed every day.
    “I hope to Christ the Germans didn't catch you at that plane. I got problems enough without having to explain for my son. Next you know, they'll be thinking you're a Partisan. And you know what they do to Partisans.”
    It was not a question. His father took a deep pull on his cigarette. It was poorly rolled,