Free Without Blood by Alessandro Baricco Page A

down.
    “Wait, take this.”
    The father handed her a blanket. She spread it over the dirt and lay down again.
    She heard her father say something to her, then she saw the trapdoor lowered. She closed her eyes and opened them. Blades of light filtered through the floorboards. She heard the voice of her father as he went on speaking to her. She heard the sound of the baskets dragged across the floor. It grew darker under there.
    Her father asked her something. She answered. She was lying on one side. She had bent her legs, and there she was, curled up, as if in her bed, with nothing to do but go to sleep, and dream. She heard her father say something else, gently, leaning down toward the floor. Then she heard a shot, and the sound of a window breaking into a thousand pieces.
    7

    “ROCA! . . . COME OUT, ROCA . . . DON’T DO ANYTHING
    STUPID, JUST COME OUT.”
    Manuel Roca looked at his son. He crept toward the boy, careful not to move into the open. He reached for the gun on the table.
    “Get away from there! Go and hide in the woodshed. Don’t come out, don’t make a sound, don’t do anything. Take the gun and keep it loaded.”
    The child stared at him without moving.
    “Go on. Do what I tell you.”
    But the child took a step toward him.
    Nina heard a hail of shots sweep the house, above her. Dust and bits of glass slid along the cracks in the floor. She didn’t move. She heard a voice calling from outside.
    “WELL, ROCA? DO WE HAVE TO COME AND GET YOU?
    I’M TALKING TO YOU, ROCA. DO I HAVE TO COME AND
    GET YOU?”
    The child was standing there, in the open. He had taken his gun, but was holding it in one hand, pointing it down and swinging it back and forth.
    “Go,” said the father. “Did you hear me? Get out of here.”
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    The child went toward him. What he was thinking was that he would kneel on the floor, and be embraced by his father. He imagined something like that.
    The father pointed the other gun at him. He spoke in a low, fierce voice.
    “Go, or I’ll kill you myself.”
    Nina heard that voice again.
    “LAST CHANCE, ROCA.”
    Gunfire fanned the house, back and forth like a pendulum, as if it would never end, back and forth like the beam of a lighthouse over a coal-black sea, patiently.
    Nina closed her eyes. She flattened herself against the blanket and curled up even tighter, pulling her knees to her chest. She liked being in that position. She felt the earth, cool, under her side, protecting her—it would not betray her. And she felt her own curled-up body, folded around itself like a shell—she liked this—she was shell and animal, her own shelter, she was everything, she was everything for herself, nothing could hurt her as long as she remained in this position. She reopened her eyes, and thought, Don’t move, you’re happy.
    Manuel Roca saw his son disappear behind the door. Then he 9

    raised himself just enough to glance out the window. All right, he thought. He moved to another window, rose, quickly took aim, and fired.
    The man in the cream-colored suit cursed and threw himself to the ground. Look at this bastard, he said. He shook his head.
    How about this son of a bitch? He heard two more shots from the farmhouse. Then he heard the voice of Manuel Roca.
    “FUCK OFF, SALINAS.”
    The man in the cream-colored suit spit. Go fuck yourself, you bastard. He glanced to his right and saw that El Gurre was sneering, flattened behind a stack of wood. He was holding a machine gun in his right hand, and with his left he searched his pocket for a cigarette. He didn’t seem to be in a hurry. He was small and thin, he wore a dirty hat on his head and on his feet enormous mountain clogs. He looked at Salinas. He found the cigarette. He put it between his lips. Everyone called him El Gurre. He got up and began shooting.
    Nina heard the burst of gunfire sweep the house, above her.
    Then silence. And immediately afterward another burst, longer.
    She kept her eyes open. She looked at the cracks in