Free An Owl's Whisper by Michael J. Smith Page A

Where?”
    Mother Catherine came to the door. The soldier repeated his clumsy demand.
    Mother had heard rumors of food confiscation. She saw the shovels and baskets in the soldiers’ truck and immediately knew the importance of putting them off. She sized-up the corporal: The sloppy shave. Missing button. Twitching eye. This one shouldn’t be so difficult to cow. If I can buy just a few hours, we can harvest and hide much of the garden. She snatched the document and looked it over for less than five seconds. “Ha! Absurd.” Wagging her finger, she scolded the corporal. “No, no, no, Monsieur . Where is your officer?” She had the corporal backpedaling. “Your officer. Here. Bring him!” Mother flicked her hand, as if shooing a fly. She stomped her foot and pointed to the gate. “You. Out of my sight!”
    The befuddled soldier was stumbling backward when his comrade called, “ Herr Corporal, I found the garden in back. Come on. Forget the witch.”
    As the driver backed the truck toward the garden, Schweinslauter pushed past Mother. He ran behind the vehicle to the rear of the convent building. Mother followed, shaking the document and demanding the soldiers leave.
    Barking came from the barn. As the truck lurched to a stop near the garden, Eva’s dog Caspar jumped through an open barn window and charged the soldiers, yapping angrily. The growling dog chased one of them onto a cement bench. He used an empty bushel basket to fend off Caspar’s bared teeth.
    The ruckus drew the girls in Sr. Arnaude’s literature class to the window. Terrified, they watched Schweinslauter stride to the cab of the truck and snatched a rifle. Laughing, he aimed. “Don’t move, Franz,” he hollered. “I’ll save you from the wolf.” At that, Eva bolted from the window, running out of the classroom and down the stairs that led to the school’s back door.
    Outside, before the corporal could fire, Mother scooped Caspar into her arms. She glared at the soldiers. “Cowards! You’d shoot a helpless animal? You’d steal food from the mouths of starving children?” She shook her head. “Stop and think what you’re doing!”
    Schweinslauter leveled the rifle at Mother Catherine. He used the barrel to indicate, Get inside now, or else .
    With the struggling dog in her arms, Mother walked to the convent door. Each step was unrushed, even stately. Her arrival at the door was simultaneous with Eva’s.
    Eva was trembling. “I saw from the window, Mother. I was so afraid.” She pulled Caspar to herself. Scratching under his ear, Eva quieted him. Then she squeezed Mother’s hand. “I’ll never forget you risked your life to save my Caspie.”
    Mother glanced at the hand on hers and smiled. Her gaze returned to Eva’s face. “But my dear, I didn’t risk my life just to save your dog. Mostly I risked it for those men. To show them that courage and grace are possible, even in these dark days. That life can always be respected.”
    Eva huffed. “And what do you think the chances are that such men will grasp your lesson?”
    “I don’t know, Eva. I only know I did all I could, unveiling a truth for them to see, if they’ll look honestly.”
    For a moment, Eva peered silently at the floor. When she looked up, her face was streaked with tears, for a veil before her own eyes had momentarily lifted and the truth she glimpsed shook her bedrock beliefs. She turned and ran, holding Caspar tight to her breast.
    In two hours, Schweinslauter and his men took most of the root vegetables, the potatoes, the ripe apples and green pears. They made sure to tromp much of what they didn’t harvest before driving off to the station in Lefebvre. That night the food was on a train bound for Germany.
    With the chill winds of November howling, the outlook was for a cold and hungry winter. And as food supplies went, so did the spirits of the St. Sébastien girls.
    One frosty December night just after lights out, the eve of the feast of St. Nicholas, the